Fractured Lives: A Place Called Tarsus IV
by citrus luver
Summary: Even at a young age, Jim had known he was different but sometimes different is okay. Sometimes different is better. Sometimes different saves you. These are Jim's early years. The years Jim wishes he could forget but can't because he lived and they didn't. The years that lead to the best thing in his life, even if it's fleeting. These are the before during and after Tarsus years.
1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note: **This was inspired by a prompt on the Buckle-up meme on Live Journal. However since the actual fill of the prompt won't happen for a while to prevent spoilers I won't reveal what the actual prompt is until most of the prompt has been filled.

Warning! This fic will contain eventually contain suicide attempt, implied/referenced child abuse, medical experimentation and trauma, and child abandonment. A large fraction of this fic will be very dark.

I'm also 100% not an expert in many of the themes covered in this fic. Some of the themes I have experience with while others I do not. I sincerely hope I do not offend anyone. I will accept any advice wholeheartedly.

There is also some hand wavy science to make the premise of this fic work.

Please enjoy.

**Fractured Lives: A Place Called Tarsus IV**

**Chapter 1**

In the wake of World War III, the nuclear blast that had eliminated a large fraction of the world's population had also changed the ideology behind reproduction. It seemed that the old adage that the universe strove to maintain its constant was once again proving to be true.

Gender classification became more difficult. Since the dawn of time, the popular belief was that males were classified as those with XY chromosomes which allowed for the formation of male sex organs while females were classified as those with XX chromosomes which allowed for the formation of female sex organs. Prior to the war, a few people with genetic defects possessed more Xs and Ys than biologically suitable. However, they were mostly sterile or a select few were fertile in one direction.

With the dawn of the new era, an onslaught of children born in the wake of nuclear warfare possessed the genetic makeup of both XX and XY. They were born with both eggs and sperm, and they possessed a working uterus and testicles. Purists claimed that these children were unnatural and a byproduct of unethical eugenics experiments. They lobbied for these children to be rounded up and purged from society.

By the 22nd century, this genetic anomaly had long been believed to be eradicated by medical advancements and gene therapy. However by the 23rd century, male pregnancy was thrown into the forefront of medical research. Male-male bonded mates longed to have biological children of their own. Most turned to surrogacy and gene splicing. However there were some that longed for that nine month bonding experience shared between a mother and her unborn child. This research became classified as Plan R.

Even at a young age, Jim Kirk knew he was different. He knew his daddy died the day he was born, and it made his mommy sad. While most children received the comfort of their parents growing up, his mother couldn't bear to even look at him. All she could see in him was his dead father.

His older brother Sammy was two and a half when their daddy died. Jim saw it in his brother's eyes. Jim and their mommy had come home, but their daddy did not. Jim grew up knowing that his brother blamed him for their daddy's death. That somehow it was Jim's birth that had caused their daddy to die. There were more times than Jim could count when Sammy would start to play too rough. Jim always wondered if Sammy thought he could switch Jim for their father.

There was also Jim's little gift. At least that's what Granny Davis called it. She was the only one that saw it as a gift. His mommy didn't talk about it, and Sammy was too angry and too bitter. Granddad Jim was old and a little senile. Grandma Kirk would burst into tears, for she could only see her dead little boy with so much lost potential while Grandpa Tiberus just seemed to want nothing to do with him.

Jim always thought that everyone was like him. It was only one scorching Iowan summer day when he was seven that he learned differently. Sammy had just turned ten. Sammy had proudly proclaimed he was a big boy now not like Jimmy. He had two digits to his age.

Their mommy was home. She was always home for Sammy's birthday. She seemed sad and aggravated every time Jim tried to get her attention. He had made her a drawing of the stars and Daddy's starship. They were all on Daddy's bridge: Jim, Sammy, Mommy and Daddy. They were all smiling and going to see worlds that no man had gone before.

"Take your brother with you, George," Mommy finally said after the fourth time Jim tugged on her pant leg.

"Aww, Ma, do I have to? He'll only get in the way." Sam was already one foot out the door.

Jim guessed it was the look their mommy gave him, but Sammy agreed to let Jim tag along. It seemed to take less persuasion than normal. They were well past the edge of the farm and walking down the only gravel path in Riverside when Sammy stopped them. He turned around and stared at Jim.

"We're going skinny dipping, Jimmy. Don't do anything funny." Sammy poked him hard in the chest.

Jim opened his mouth to protest. Mommy had always told him to keep his clothes on, but the look in Sammy's eyes and that Sammy hadn't ditched him on the edge of the farm like he normally did. Sammy was letting him play… no… hang out with the big kids. Jim immediately closed his mouth. "I won't Sammy. I promise."

When they finally arrived at the pond, it seemed all the kids in the neighborhood that Sammy always said were cool were there. Most were already in the water. Jim's eyes widened. He couldn't help from staring. He had never seen so many bodies. None of them were wearing any clothes. He probably should have realized then. Sammy punched him in the side. "Stop staring, Jimmy," Sammy hissed into his ear.

Jared, Sammy's best friend, was the first to notice them. "George," he called out. Jared had a loud voice. Everyone else called Sammy George. It was his real name. It was also their daddy's name. Sammy pulled him along by the shirt sleeve. Jim tried to pull free, but Sammy's grip just got tighter.

"You brought Jimmy?" Jared wrinkled his nose. Jared never liked him. Jim figured that Jared saw him only as a bratty little kid like his own little brothers and sisters. Jim didn't like Jared or his siblings. He went to school with Jared's little brother. He wanted to be Jim's best friend just like Jared was Sammy's, but Jim wasn't interested in digging in the sand or playing with cars. Jim liked the stars, and he wanted to explore new worlds. He was going to be a Starfleet captain like his daddy, but he never said that anymore. Sammy had given him weird looks and said that his head was still stuck in the stars. His mommy had never looked sadder, not even on his birthday.

"Yeah," Sammy shrugged his shoulder. He had a twinkle in his eyes. He always had that look in his eyes when he was going to do something bad or devious. Sammy pushed him forward. "Go on, Jimmy. Go change." He said it a little too loudly.

Jim tugged on his shirt hem. He really didn't want to. Jared must have noticed. He smirked. "Yeah Jimmy. I thought you wanted to hang with us. Everyone is changing behind that tree." Jared pointed to a large willow tree. It was away from everyone else. It was also along the edge of the pond. He could easily jump right into the water.

Jim nodded. The willow was bigger than it looked as he walked closer. Once he was sure that he was away from peering eyes, he started to undo his belt buckle. He wasn't sure how he didn't hear, but just as he was pulling off his underwear there was a loud shriek behind him. He immediately turned around. His underwear bundled in his hands. Alison Carmichael was standing behind him. Her face was as pale as snow. "Jimmy has girl parts!" She finally managed to scream out.

All the other kids surrounded them at that point. He saw Sam chuckling in the distance. However, when they started screaming crueler things the smile on Sam's face fell.

Jim wasn't sure who the first person he punched was. His face was red and blotchy. His blue eyes were blazing and blaring. Salt tears and mucus from his nose had dribbled down and combined together as they trailed down his face. He felt like a feral animal. It took two pairs of arms to finally pull him off of Peter Jenkins. Jim was kicking and screaming. His only consolation was that Peter looked worse than he felt.

Old man Rockabee drove them home. He had looked murderous when he wrapped Jim in a thin woolen blanket. He had barely looked at Jim as he handed him his mud soaked clothes and pushed him into the back of his hover truck. Sam looked sullen the whole way home, and that okay for Jim. Jim refused to look at Sam and spent the whole ride looking out the window. Jim's face was still splotchy, and his nose was starting to hurt when Rockabee pulled up in front of the Kirk farm house.

Jim pulled the blanket tightly around his body as he trudged up the stairs. The doorbell barely rang once before their mommy answered. She looked tired, and suddenly Jim felt sorry for what he had done. "James! George!" Jim saw his mommy purse her lips as she scanned them. She rarely called him James. She only did it when she particularly angry with him.

"Found the boys by the pond. A fight broke out." Jim wondered if his mommy's eyes could get any wider. "They appeared to have been skinny dipping."

She nodded. She looked at Sam. Sam kicked a rock next to his foot. "Thank you." She managed to say. It seemed to take a lot of energy out of her.

"No problem." Rockabee tipped his hat and left. They stood in silence as Rockabee backed his truck out of the gravel drive way and drove away.

His mommy pulled him forward at that point. She looked at him. Jim wondered if his mommy had ever looked at him for such a long time before. She finally sighed. "Go to your room, Jimmy." His mommy whispered. She looked so sad and tired. She never disciplined him. He thought that for once she would. It seemed she never knew what to do with him. Jim nodded. He walked into the house. He heard Sam follow him. "Not you, George. We need to talk."

Jim saw from the corner of his eyes his brother's scowl. "Jimmy's the one that started it," he grumbled out.

"George." His mother really did sound mad. Jimmy quickly scuttled up stairs.

Jim didn't know what their mommy said to Sam. She never disciplined in the house. She always took Sam away, deeper into the field. When they returned, he saw that Sam was favoring his left side, and his hazel eyes were teary.

Dinner that night was quiet and somber. It was only Jim and Mommy. She placed a plate of replicated food in front of him. She never cooked. He figured it was because she spent so much of her time in space where she only ate replicated food.

Sam found him on the roof after dinner. It wasn't that he was hiding. He liked going up onto the roof. He felt it was the closest he could get to his daddy.

"Hey, Jimmy."

"Go away." Jim muttered.

"Jimmy." Sam sighed.

Jim whipped around. He wasn't stupid. He knew. He knew Sam had done it on purpose. "Go away Sam."

"Jimmy look, I know I messed up."

"You think." Jim rubbed his shirt sleeve over his blazing blue eyes. He stood up. Even at seven-years-old, he was almost the same height as Sam. His brother backed up. Jim glared at him before he pushed him. He pushed Sam hard. It felt good. No wonder Sam was always coming home with letters from school that he had been caught fighting. Sam faltered and landed hard on his butt. He let out a loud howl as he jolted back up. Jim laughed.

He noticed a small scowl start to form on Sam's face, but it quickly disappeared. "Feel better?"

"Not really, but that was pretty funny." Jim laughed again.

Sam scratched the back of his neck. He always did that when he was nervous. "Yeah, I guess it was. Look, Jimmy." He toed the back of his right heel. "I've been a jerk." Jim crossed his arms. "For your whole life," Sam quickly added. "You don't deserve it. We're brothers: the only Kirk's left. It's us… together… against the world Jimmy."

"Grandpa Tiberus and Uncle James and …"

Sam slapped his forehead. "I'm trying to make a dramatic speech here, Dummy."

"I thought you were apologizing." Jim tried to sound mad.

"And you're making it really hard, Jimmy."

Jim glared at Sam. The glare didn't last long before they both cracked large smiles. They collapsed onto the roof. They lay there side by side. It had been a long time since Sam came out here to star gaze with him. Sam never liked the stars very much. "Together always," Sam whispered. He curled their fingers together. Jim smiled. As they stared up into the night sky, life was suddenly looking good. It seemed even the stars were twinkling extra bright.

**Author's Notes: **According to some online Star Trek encyclopedia (memory ?), it stated that Winona's maiden name was Davis. Unfortunately, I could not find any of Jim's grandmothers' first names anywhere. I will attempt to avoid needing to use them. However if it gets too strange later on, I will make some up unless it's actually stated in some novel or comic.

Also, Memory Beta stated that George Kirk Sr. actually has a brother named James. Original I know.

Thank you for reading. I will attempt a weekly update.


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2**

However Jim should have known. Sam was never good at keeping promises. His mother had been sad and aggravated because of Frank. They met him a week later.

Mommy made them dress in their Sunday bests. Jim thought they looked silly, but Sam just looked murderous. He kept giving their mommy the stink eye as if she had broken all the laws in the universe. Sam punched him in ribs when he asked. "You're so stupid Jimmy."

When Jim punched back, their mommy didn't even notice. She was too busy looking out the window and fiddling with the flowers. She never bought flowers. They were pretty. It made their house look brighter. Jim probably should have realized then that something was wrong, but Mommy was rarely home, and their android babysitter was hardly a good example.

Frank was big and beefy. He looked like just the opposite of Daddy. Everything Daddy was; Frank was not. While Daddy had a pretty smile and blue eyes, Frank wore a constant frown and had dark grey eyes. He was a hover car mechanic from Iowa City. It was an uncomfortable afternoon. It was hot and sticky.

Frank left after dinner. They watched their mommy kiss Frank on the front porch through the windows in the living room. She didn't even notice that had been there. Sam stomped off, but Jim was just confused. He thought his mommy loved his daddy. Wasn't that why she was always so sad? Wasn't that why she always spent her days in space, so she could be closer to Daddy?

The next day, Mommy sat them down in the living room: Sam and Jim on the couch and Mommy across from them. Sam folded his arms. He was not impressed. She promised them many things that day. She promised them that things would change. They could be a real family now with a mommy, a daddy, George, Jim, and more. She promised no more space missions. She was going to get a dirt side positing. Sam pursed his lips, but Jim started entertaining the thought that maybe Frank could be their new daddy. He had seen the holo videos of his daddy playing with Sam. He saw how happy Mommy had been back then. She had a pretty smile. Maybe Frank could make Mommy happy again. Maybe Frank could play with him. Maybe he could finally do those father and son activities that he saw and heard his classmates participate in. Maybe he and Frank could enter the annual father and son chariot race.

Mommy and Frank got married a month later. He heard the words shotgun wedding and convenience whispered under the breaths of the attendees. At seven, Jim didn't even know what they had meant.

But Frank wanted his own kids. After Mommy's second miscarriage, the words "cursed womb" traveled around Riverside. Even Jim knew that miscarriages were rare in the 23rd century. Sam tried to shield him from it, but Jim heard. He heard it all. That it was Jim's abnormality that broke Mommy, and that was why she couldn't have any more kids. That Jim wasn't really his daddy's son, and his mommy had 'affair', and it was all celestial judgment.

Mommy started traveling again soon after that, and Frank became angry and abusive. Jim guessed that she gave up on having a normal family after that.

He probably should have given Sam more credit. He did last five years of living with an angry Frank. Sam was fifteen when he ran away from home. It had started after a stupid argument. Sam wanted to spend the night at his friend's house. Frank forbade it because he could.

That same day Jim drove their dad's prized Chevy convertible into the Riverside quarry. It was last thing Jim had of his father. He never felt more alive clinging to the edge of the cliff or jumping out of the spending car. He thought he could make the jump. He thought he could finally leave Riverside.

Their mom came home furious and confused. "Why Jimmy? Why."

Jim wanted to tell her about Frank. How cruel and awful he was. That Frank was abusive and angry. That he would hit him and Sam after he drank too much at the bar. That Frank had driven Sam away. That Frank wanted to sell his dad's car, and it better lying in the bottom of the quarry than in someone else's hands. That he was being unfaithful to her and would entertain women and men in their bed, in their living room… everywhere. Instead Jim bit his lips and refused to look her in the eyes. She eventually gave up and left. It wasn't hard. Giving up was something she was good at.

The next day, when Jim woke up he found the space between his legs and bed sheets soaked with blood. He screamed thinking it was divine punishment. He was going to die, and his dad would come home.

His mom found him screaming. When she saw the blood red sheets, she closed the door and held him close. Jim wasn't sure she had ever done that before. She told him about the people of the past. She told him that he was a special little one. After he took a warm bath, she taught him how to use a tampon and gave him a training bra. She scheduled an appointment with a doctor in Chicago the next day. It was at a small, classified hospital. Jim wondered if his mother was ashamed of him.

They left early in the morning. They took a small dilapidated freighter out from Riverside Shipyard. It was a supply vessel. His mother sat in the front with the pilot while Jim sat with the merchandise. They were old starship parts. Jim could name them all.

The hospital was cold and menacing. The waiting room was filled with old people. They were all old and wrinkly. They reminded Jim of his granddad James. Jim swung his legs as his mother filled out his paperwork. When they finally called for him, his mother didn't come with him. She simply pushed him forward. Before he disappeared behind the double swinging doors, he saw her pull out a cigarette. He wondered when she started smoking.

The nurse led him to a room in the back. It was small room. There was a large bio bed in the center of the room. Jim immediately recognized it as an older model. Sam used to show him holos of bio beds. He had always been interested in medicine and science unlike Jim who liked physics and mechanical parts. There were other machines humming along the walls. A large fluorescent light swung above him.

Jim gulped. His hands became sweaty. He tried to wipe them on his pant legs. The nurse handed him a gown before leaving. He found himself sitting on that biobed in a gown that barely covered his thighs for what felt like hours. He thought he would die in that room before a large porky man entered. He introduced himself as John… just John. He listed the procedures and tests in big, sophisticated scientific terms. Jim wasn't sure who he was trying to impress.

The tests started out simple and easy. John took his height, his weight and his blood pressure. He easily recited out the letters that were reflected on the wall in the distance. He could easily distinguish his 'U's from his 'V's and his 'F's from his 'P's. Eye tests never involved easy letters.

However everything changed when John had him lay down on the biobed and hooked him up to all the sensors. He maneuvered his legs into a pair of birthing stirrups. He wondered how he hadn't noticed them earlier. He started at his chest and worked his way down. He pressed and probed with his hands and with a tricorder. Jim had always thought medical tricorders allowed for a more hands off approach.

Jim could state the exact moment where everything became less friendly. He could see the glim and excitement that suddenly appeared in John's eyes. John had worked his way to his lower regions. He was sitting on a stool. His forehead was barely blinking out from behind the gown. He could feel John fingers sliding around his private parts. They were cold and hard. He squirmed. It earned him a hard slap on his legs. John tightened the straps on the stirrups.

Jim watched as John bolt upwards minutes later. He watched him hastily removing his gloves before reaching for the door knob. John disappeared through the door. The door closed with a loud bang. Jim cringed. Not long afterwards, John led in a team of doctors in white lab coats. They were all holding PADDs.

They didn't even bother to introduce themselves. Jim wondered if they even realized he was a human being. Their eyes were all so cold and daunting. They reminded him so much of Frank. One by one they sat down in the seat John had vacated. He felt each and every one of them touch him. It was cold and impersonal: plastic on skin.

He looked away after the third one. His glaze flickered between the posters of dental hygiene, the digestive track, and eyeballs. His face burned red. He thought doctors were supposed to be friendly and kind. He was blushing ten shades of red by the sixth.

His palms got sweaty. The straps tied around his legs felt biting as if they were digging into his skin. He felt sick. He wanted to scream, to hit something, anything. He wanted to run away. The wall seemed to physically close in. He felt violated. He felt like a circus animal on display.

It was humiliating. It was invasive. He was going to puke. He choked back a loud sob when the last doctor finally left the chair, and John loosened the straps. He guessed they were doctors. However, the way they talked in hushed voices about how rare he was as if he wasn't even in the room, he wasn't so sure. He recognized the looks in their eyes. It was the same look he saw in Sam's eyes when he became excited about one of his plant specimens.

They left soon after that. It was just him and John again. He hated John. John had called in the doctors. He struggled when John grabbed his arm. John must be retaliating when he grabbed his arm tighter than necessary and stabbed him hard with the needle. He watched as his blood drained through the clear tube and into one of the machines along the walls.

He wondered if he gone through every type of medical tests in the books by the time John finally handed him his clothes and gruffly told him to go to consultation room ten after he was done changing.

He was never going to set foot in a hospital ever again.

He found his mother there. John and one of the doctors that had 'examined' him were also there. It was one of the older men. His hair line was already receding. He was now wearing glasses which confused Jim. Nobody wore glasses anymore. He sat down in the only empty chair left. It was between the doctor and his mother.

The doctor handed his mother a PADD. "Your son is a medical phenomenon. His existence could change science, mankind, and reproduction as we know it," the doctor gushed out.

His mother frowned. She set down the PADD. She glared back at the doctor. At that moment, Jim saw an inkling of the commanding officer in his mother. "My son is not a test specimen." Jim had never heard his mother so angry before. She was usually just tired and sad. "We're here to make sure he's healthy."

The doctor seemed startled. He quickly recovered. "Of course," he coughed. "That's not why we're here. Human experimentation has long ended." The doctor picked up the PADD. He swiped the screen as he talked. "Your son is perfectly healthy in all the ways. In fact…" the doctor smiled and rotated the PADD screen. "He's 100% fertile as a male and a female." The doctor pointed at his screen. "As you can see, James here has a perfectly well formed uterus, fallopian tubes and a birth canal."

Jim looked at the small pear shape organ that the doctor was pointing at. He knew enough biology from school that boys did not have that. The doctor swiped again, and another image appeared. These were of parts Jim knew he was supposed to have. "His testicles have fully dropped and are producing viable sperm."

John coughed.

"I'm not a medical doctor, Doctor…"

"Williams," the old man flinched. "Of course." He swiped his PADD again. It was a merged imaged of the two previous images into one. "James here seems to be operating as a male and female hybrid. The human body is truly remarkable. His biometrics shows that he's developing into both a young man and a young woman. His body seems to have categorized and separated the production of differing hormones much like in slugs or earthworms."

"My son is not a slug or a earthworm." His mother did not sound pleased. He saw the heavy frown lines forming on her forehead.

Williams coughed. "Of course not, do you have any questions before I bring in Dr. Hansen?"

Jim squirmed. There was one question. It wasn't even a serious question. He knew enough biology. "Does that mean I can clone myself?" Jim blurted out.

Williams turned to look at him. He wondered if that was the first time he even noticed him. Williams immediately coughed and shook his head. "No, you possess natural barriers to prevent that."

"Damn." He wasn't that sorry. He didn't want kids. It was official. He was too abnormal and too different to possibly even consider passing his genes down to anyone.

"James, watch your language." His mother hissed.

They bought in Dr. Hansen afterwards. It turned out Dr. Hansen was a child psychologist specializing in gender. She was a little old lady with deep brown eyes. She was kinder than Williams had ever been. That was the first time any one discussed gender and the possibility of hormone therapy when he was older with him.

"You're a hermaphrodite, James." That was the first time he heard the 'h' word that would define his life. At 12, it meant nothing to him. "You don't have to be a boy, James," she said kindly.

Jim just blinked back. He was a boy. That was the only thing that his dad knew about him. The only thing his dad knew was that he had another son. His dad didn't even get to see him before he died. He had just heard his cries and his mother describing him as beautiful and perfect. Jim always scoffed at that.

They had named him James Tiberus Kirk over a comm link. Jim shook his head. He had no gender crisis. He was just a boy who would develop breasts and get a period every month. Somehow that was okay.

"You don't have to decide now. There is also surgery or other methods of concealment that could hide some of the… excess parts." She reached down for the bag that she had brought with her.

His mother immediately coughed. "That won't be necessary. Jim isn't ashamed of his body. He's healthy and a gift." The words were harsh and forced. Jim wondered who she was trying to convince, and if she even believed anything she just said. "Thank you for your time. We'll be leaving now." She grabbed his arm. Jim blinked before bolting upwards.

However he soon found out just what it meant to go through two types of opposing puberty. Maybe he should have listened or even considered the alternatives that the doctors could have recommended, but he wasn't anxious to go back there. His shoulders broadened. A noticeable Adam's apple started to form on his neck. His voice started to crack. He started growing whiskers and pubic hair. At the same time, his hips started to widen, and he started developing breasts. At 12, they were still tiny buds that were barely noticeable. Worst of all, every month he bled from an orifice that he wasn't supposed to have and a place he wasn't supposed to bleed from.

It made him flighty and vindictive. His mother went back to space. Sam didn't come home from Grandpa Tiberus'. It was just Jim and Frank. After the Chevy convertible incident, Frank no longer demanded much of Jim. Jim wondered if Frank even noticed he was still around sometimes. He saw the way Frank now looked at him. It was same way most people in Riverside looked at him… a little freak with too many body parts. Frank had never truly known until that day. He wondered if Frank would have married his mother had he known.

As a result Jim spent most of his days away from the farm house. By the end of the summer, Jim found himself associating with the rougher crowd in Riverside. They were the only ones that didn't care. They found it useful.

On his 13th birthday, he was arrested for the first time for vandalism and drug dealing. He had been earning black market credit chips by trafficking drugs and Romulan ale through Riverside Shipyard.

He knew Frank wouldn't bail him out when they told him the sum of the bail bond. Frank had always said that Jim wasn't worth the air he breathed or the credits Jim cost him. He spent three months in the juvenile petitionary. Big Joe, a big beefy teenage, found him amusing and took him under.

"I see myself in you, Kid." Big Joe had said the first day Jim showed up. Jim saw the muscles and the tattoos he was sporting. Jim wanted to laugh.

He taught Jim how to pick locks. He taught him how to hide contraband from the guards and use body language to him advantage. Jim was a natural. As a result, Jim smoked and drank his way through an assortment of alien drugs and moonshine. Big Joe laughed and called him his 'little protégée'.

Big Joe also taught him sexual skills involving his tongue and fingers. "It's all in the flick, Jimmy," Big Joe said through a mouthful of cock. That was the night Jim found Big Joe sucking off a guard in a dark hallway.

He would have stayed longer if his mother hadn't returned home for shore leave. That night he heard the screams and the angry voices echo throughout the farm house.

"He's uncontrollable."

"You left him in jail."

"That boy needs to learn his dues."

"He could have been assaulted."

"He was trafficking drugs."

It ended with his mother in tears and Frank storming out in rage. He thought that was the end of Frank. His brother could come home now, and his mother would stay dirt side. The next morning, he found his mother and Frank sitting at the kitchen table. They both had pursed lips. There was a pamphlet in front of them. Most importantly their fingers were interlocked. At that moment, all the hope drained from Jim's eyes.

"Tarsus IV." His mother pushed the pamphlet towards him.

The words were alien to him. "It's a colonization attempt by the Federation, Jimmy." His mother sounded so tired. The logistics were easy. He was going to stay with a foster family. They were scientists sent by Starfleet. They had a son a few years younger than him. "It would be an adventure," she said. "Hadn't he always wanted to see new worlds?"

For Jim, he saw it as a way to get away from Frank. It would be away from the hellhole that was Riverside. He thought everything would be better on Tarsus, Tarsus where nobody knew about his genetic abnormality.

He thought Tarsus would be a fucking second chance.


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter 3 **

Jim was given a week to pack his belongings. It took him barely an hour. He never believed in keeping personal mementos, and there sure as hell wasn't anything of sentimental value for him in fucking Riverside.

Shipping out of Riverside also meant he didn't have to go back to school, and that was okay for Jim. He had been out of school for so long that he would probably have to repeat the year anyways. School had stopped meaning anything after Sam ran away, and he crashed his dad's Chevy convertible. School had always bored him. The classes involved counting livestock and plotting lunar planting cycles. He wasn't going to be a farmer or a rancher like most people in his class were going to be.

He spent his days in his room surfing on his PADD and reading old 16th century plays. He knew he was probably the only thirteen-year-old who read William Shakespeare in this era. The man's words seemed to transcend time. Some of the plays like Hamlet and A Midsummer Night's Dream he had read numerous times.

His holographic star ships twirled in the air above his head. He had all the latest models. They were holographic models of starships that Starfleet sent him every year on his birthday. It was one of the many forms of retribution from Starfleet.

He only left his rooms for meals. His mother insisted that they all sit at the dining room table together as a family. He wasn't sure why his mother was even trying anymore. His mother and Frank sat on one side of the table, and Jim sat on the other side. Sam's seat was empty. Nobody mentioned Sam anymore. He wondered if his mother even cared.

"Jim, eat your greens," she pushed a plate of overcooked, boiled replicated broccoli and cabbage in front of him.

Jim blinked.

"Eat your greens, Jim," she said again.

Any other time, Jim would have argued or remarked about why she even cared. However, this time it wasn't worth it. He was going to leave soon. He stabbed his fork into the overcooked vegetables. He over dramatized taking a large bite. When he was sure his mother was satisfied and turned her attention back to her own dinner, Jim slid the rest of the vegetables under a slice of bread. He was decidedly not going to eat the vegetables.

When the week ended, Jim was almost reluctant to leave. He had forgotten how different Frank could be when his mother was around. Frank was actually normal and fuck… friendly. He hadn't gone to the bar and gotten himself wasted. Fuck, Frank even offered to take him out for ice cream one night after dinner. He decidedly said 'no'. He wasn't sure who was more relieved: him or Frank.

However the morning of his departure, he woke up and found his mother in her Starfleet uniform and her bags by the door. He knew then. Nothing would change. She couldn't even fucking stay long enough to see him be shipped off.

"Sorry, Jimmy. Starfleet won't let me take anymore shore leave." She pulled him into a feeble hug that was awkward for them both. She ruffled his blond bangs. "You be good on Tarsus, Jimmy."

Jim nodded. It wasn't a promise or anything.

She left quickly after that, and Frank's happy mask immediately disappeared. Jim quickly locked himself in his room.

Jim sat on his bed. He looked around the empty room. The same room he had lived in for over thirteen years. It looked so unlived in. He had managed to fit his entire life into two duffle bags. The only things left were his bed, this desk and his chair. There wasn't much nostalgia left for him. It had long disappeared when Sam ran away, and his mother left them with Frank.

When his PADD flashed 1600, Jim picked up his two bags from the floor. He sighed. He had to go find Frank and convince him to take him to the shipyard. When he wandered into the living room, he almost laughed. His mother hadn't even been gone for six hours, and Frank was already 'entertaining'. Jim had always been curious where Frank found them.

He was currently being sandwiched between two Andorians. An Andorian male was currently mounting im from behind. An Andorian female was currently sucking him off from the front. Frank had buried his face into her blue skin. A second Andorian female was sprawled out on his mother upholstered couch. She was naked and blue. She was plucking purple grapes off its vines. They were contained in one of his mother's crystalline bowls. Any other day, he would have walked over and pulled the bowl away. He hated it when any of Frank's 'guests' touched any of his mother's possessions. They were dirty. It was dirty. He recognized it immediately as one of his parents' wedding presents from a distant great-aunt that he had never met. There were many relatives he never met. Sam had always said their father's death had broken their family.

It was the one on the couch who noticed him first. She winked at him. He wanted to puke. She draped one arm over the arm rest and threw her head back. Her blue antennas twitched excitedly. She brushed back her silver bangs from her eyes. "Frankie, there is a boy watching us," she said lazily. She popped another grape into her large sultry lips. She licked her fingers.

Frank looked up startled, his mouth in mid moan. He immediately closed it when he noticed Jim. He saw Frank flash his grey eyes at him. He pushed the female and male Andorians away. "That's just Jimmy. He's a she-man. Jimmy, show them." Frank barked out one of his crueler laughs.

"Exciting," the Andorian female who had been giving Frank a blow job exclaimed. She licked her lips. Jim could see Frank's cum leaking from her lips and between the large gaps in her teeth.

"Fuck off, Frank." Jim hissed. He was finally going to get as far away as possible from Frank. He regretted all those years of never telling his mother about Frank's unfaithfulness.

"He's fierce, Frankie. Why haven't you introduced us sooner?" The Andorian on the couch asked. She popped another grape into her mouth. "And pretty… especially the eyes. They are so blue."

"He's just a little freak." Frank laughed. "Git!" He picked up a beer bottle from the table. He threw it at him. Jim had learned long ago to not flinch. Frank had never been able to hit him when he was like this. Like always, the bottle bounced off the wall. It left a dark stain on the wall. He hoped his mother would come home and see it. Frank used to make him clean the beer stains off the walls after his escapades. He doubted Frank would bother to do it now. He was too lazy and disgusting.

Frank wasn't worth it. He had never been worth it. Jim tightened hold on his duffle bags and swung them over his shoulders. Frank was disgusting. He had always been disgusting. Jim turned on his heels and slammed the front door hard. He heard Frank scream 'freak' at him one last time.

He hadn't realized he had been holding his breath until the warm blast of late Iowan spring heat hit him squarely in his face. Standing there alone on the front porch of the farmhouse, Jim realized he didn't have to go to Tarsus. He was free. He was free from his mother. He was free from Frank. He could already hear Frank and the Andorians' moans echoing throughout the farm house.

His mother would soon be outside the subspace frequency range. Frank would never come looking for him. Sam had run away to his grandparents' farm, and his mother never brought him back. However he wasn't Sam, and most importantly he would still be in fucking Riverside. Jim repositioned his bags. He glanced back one more time at the farm house. There was nothing here for him. "Anywhere is better than fucking Riverside." Jim muttered. He clenched his duffle bags tighter.

It was a long walk to Riverside Shipyards. Even in the late afternoon, it was still bustling with workers. It had been a long time since Starfleet commissioned a large star ship. It was no secret that since the Kelvin incident, Starfleet had become more hesitant to launch new starships. However, there was still work in the form of small scale ships and shuttles.

It wasn't hard to find his shuttle. The outbound shuttles were all located in one section of the shipyard. There was only one shuttle going to Jupiter Station. He barely made it. He was the last one to board. They didn't even ask for his tickets or his paper work. It was probably better that way since his mother never gave them to him, and Frank had probably lost them or had used them as toilet paper.

He took a window seat in the back of the shuttle. He stuffed his bags under his seat. He barely had time to pull his harness over his shoulder blades before the shuttle took off. He probably should have been more excited as the shuttle reached its cruising attitude. He had never traveled far enough during any of his previous shuttle rides to break through the atmosphere.

However as they neared Jupiter Station, Jim did press his face against the glass panel. Jupiter Station was one of the Sol System's main outbound hubs. The other was San Francisco Fleet Yard that orbited Earth. However, San Francisco Yards also doubled as a star ship construction station. Once all the outer hull pieces were assembled together at Riverside Shipyard they were individually transported to San Francisco Fleet Yard and then bolted together. It created twice as many jobs.

Jupiter Station was larger and shinier. He had only seen pictures of it on his PADD and in holovids at school. The little shuttle looked so small and inconsequential among the long rows of Starfleet starships that were lined up in one section of the space station. They were all glorious silver ladies. He wondered if his dad's starship had been just as sparkly, or if the one that was taking his mother further and further away from him was just as jaw dropping. He loved their crisp, clean designs. He could admire them for hours.

He was the last to leave the shuttle. He shuffled out and stepped into the large station. Jupiter station was the galactic transportation hub between the Sol system and the rest of the universe. Its lower levels were off limits to civilians and served as a research and military base.

He whistled when he directed his gaze upwards. They had never mentioned in any of the books just how tall the ceilings were. There were portions of the ceiling that were transparent. He could even see the stars and asteroid belt in the far distance.

There was a wide variety of humans and aliens from all over the galaxy here. He could easily recognize the Andorians, Vulcans and Tellarities. Jim knew his Federation history. He could easily distinguish the founding members of the United Federation of Planets despite Riverside Iowa being one of Earth's more homogenous towns. Jim was used to a sea of white with a few foreigners who lived around Riverside shipyard. They rarely ventured out to the rest of the town and always seemed to be a different band of people. They were mysterious and interesting not liked the natives. Jim always figured if it were not for the shipyard; Riverside could still be lost in the 20th century.

His shuttle out to the Tarsus system wasn't until late, or was it early in the day? He figured he shouldn't be measuring dates or times by the Earth's relation to the sun. Soon, he would be far away from this solar system, and Tarsus would be orbiting a different sun or was it suns? It wasn't nostalgia. He had never been partial to this sun.

It seemed like everyone else had a place to go and things to see. Riverside had always been slow, slower than Jim would have liked. Jim had always been a boy of action. He didn't like lazy Sundays. Jim remembered when Granny Davis said, "Jimmy, you're definitely a Kirk. You've always been in a rush since the day you were born." She only said that once. They all knew the implications of that statement. Jim had been born almost four months early. Had he not been, his dad would have never even heard his first cries. Jim wondered if his mother would have named him Tiberus after all.

A knobby finger tugged at his shirt sleeve. Jim whipped around. It belong a short alien. He looked more like a toad than a humanoid. There was a horrible, swampy stench surrounding him.

"Are you lost, little one?" The alien asked. He grinned at him. "Would you like a… guide?" He licked his lips. Jim pulled free from the alien. He shook his head.

"You're a pretty little…" The alien sniffed him. "Girl. Accidents could happen."

"I ain't a girl."

"I'm never wrong, little girl."

Jim rolled his eyes. "Well, you are now."

The alien sniffed him again. He smiled revealing a row of golden yellow teeth. "Peculiar, very peculiar."

"So, I've heard." Jim muttered and turned away. He heard the alien laugh at him as he walked away. _Fucking weird._

He eventually found himself in a shopping strip. His stomach grumbled as he wandered through the rows of Deltan jewelry. His mother's wedding ring had been of Deltan made. He had seen it once a long time ago before Frank, before he grew up and realized his mere presence caused her pain. It was simple and elegant unlike the gaudy ring Frank had given her. That had been the one and only gift Frank had ever given his mother.

He stayed until the store owner started giving him uneasy looks. Jim didn't blame him. He didn't know Jim had enough credits under his name to buy out the entire store. One of the perks of being the son of a decreased Starfleet officer was the annual credits Starfleet deposited under his name as reparation. Jim and any future children he would have would receive these payments for life. It was Starfleet's belief that a death in the family would impact at least two generations. Jim always suspected Frank never knew that Jim had access to the credits. They weren't 'moveable' funds until his eighteen's birthday, but Jim wasn't a genius for nothing.

He ate dinner at a small oriental noodle booth. A green alien with horns served him. He had never seen this type of alien before. The noodles were cool and sweet. They tasted different from anything he had ever eaten before. He tried paying in Federation credits. The alien just laughed. "Keep your credits, Kid. Starfleet doesn't use money."

Jim blinked. He had heard rumors that Starfleet was like a community of its own. Starfleet officers and personnel believed that work was solely for personal growth, and that was enough of compensation. The day anyone enlisted in Starfleet; Starfleet in turn would take care of that enlisted crew member. Everything a member of Starfleet 'owned' was Starfleet issued.

He left the booth quickly after that and found a seat near a vacuum proof window. The glow illuminated from the star ships on the other side of the window felt warm and tender. For a while he observed the civilians and officers that passed by. He tried guessing from their appearance and state of mind where they were going and where they came from. There was no way he could confirm any of his guesses, but it was still fun. When he got tired, he pulled out his PADD and started reading the tales of Horatio Hornblower. He loved the old naval stories of Horatio and his crew.

The ship out to Tarsus ended up being delayed. Jim was yawning and could barely keep his eyes open when he finally boarded the USS Republic. It was long past midnight in Iowa. He could barely remember being welcomed by the captain. He just remembered the captain had a large smile and twinkling chocolate brown eyes. The USS Republic was a smaller ship with only a crew of three hundred. It was an older design left over from the early days before the foundation of the United Federation of Planets.

He was given quarters in one of the lower decks of the ship. There were already three other people fast asleep in the room. He remembered the lieutenant that showed him the room saying that they were engineering ensigns. She was apologetic about it. Normally civilians received their own rooms, but they hadn't expected so many late arrivals to Tarsus. As she left, she mentioned that she hoped the low hum from the ship's wrap core wouldn't keep him awake. It usually took a long time to get used to. She laughed that she wasn't sure she was even used to it, and she had been serving for almost five years now.

He set his bags down near his bed and pulled off his sneakers. He stayed awake long enough to see the ship disengage from the station and jump to warp speed. He fell asleep to the lull of the ship's wrap core. He never felt more alive, nor had he ever slept so well before.

**Author's Notes: **From my limited knowledge of Star Trek, I'm pretty sure star ships aren't supposed to be built in Earth despite what the 2009 movie showed. I'm just going to pretend that in the end the Enterprise was actually built in space, and what Jim saw was just the outer hull or something not actually assembled.

I haven't seen every episode of Star Trek ever made so my familiarity with alien races is still very limited. Please pardon the nondescript and not canon alien races.


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter 4 **

Jim found the time he spent on the USS Republic to be fleeting. He enjoyed every minute of it despite being unable to see most of the ship. Most of the decks required some level of security clearance which he didn't have. It also didn't help that he stood out very blatantly among the sea of Starfleet issued uniforms that the crew members wore, so he couldn't exactly sneak into one of more highly secured areas of the ship. He was particularly annoyed that he couldn't go into the bridge though.

The first morning on board the ship, he had been planning on sleeping in late. Frank never let him. Frank used to barrage into his room with a breath laced with ethanol and nicotine and a body which reeked of sex at the crack of dawn to force him and Sam to do their chores before school started. He had tried once to lock his bedroom door, but Frank had torn the door off the hinge and done almost equal damage to his arms. Sam had pulled Frank off in time.

It was a long time later before Frank let him fix the door. It was mostly because his mother was returning home.

Sam had called him a dummy and refused to talk to him for a week afterwards. Jim used to wonder if Sam thought that was the best punishment… silence. Jim wasn't stupid. He never made the same mistake twice.

Jim and Sam practically ran the Kirk farm before Sam ran away, and he crashed his dad's car. He hadn't even bothered to take one last look at the farm before he left. He wondered if Frank would run it to the ground now. Frank wasn't a farmer. That had obvious after the first harvest season. Jim sometimes contemplated how Frank and his mother happened. They were like two different people as dissimilar as night and day.

However, at 0600 the ensigns whose room he was sharing noisy woke up. They were all loud and rowdy. They were bragging to each other about who had the most important duty rooster for the day. It was obvious from their conversations that this was their first assignment, and they were all fresh out of the academy.

They didn't even seem particularly apologetic when they realized they had awakened him. He watched them bustle around the room throwing their sleeping garments on the floor before replacing them with their uniforms.

He had waited until after they all left the room before getting out bed. The sonic showers were strange and different. They lacked the smoothing feel of water. He had always been used to taking a shower which consisted of water. Riverside had never been low on water. It was one of the rainier parts of the world however he knew enough that water on starship was rare.

It had taken him awhile to find the mess hall. He vaguely remembered the lieutenant mentioning which deck it had been when they had taken the turbo lift the night before.

By the time he found the mess hall; it was mostly empty. There were only a few crew members huddled in the corner drinking what he surmised was coffee or hot tea. Most were reading their PADDs.

He was surprised that the mess hall contained not only food synthesizers which lined along the wall space but also an honest to goodness cook who made certain dishes to order. There was a large interactive board with the menu that flashed above the cooking station. There was a wide array of breakfast dishes. There were simple dishes like cereal and toast all the way to the more complicated dishes like omelets and breakfast burritos.

He had eaten his share of synthesized meals in Iowa. Frank and his mother never cooked. The choice was simple. He stepped forward. The cook, he was a jolly elder man. Jim could see streaks of white already appearing around his side burns. He had the bushiest eye brows that Jim had ever seen. The cook's eyes widened when he saw him. "What can Chef Roberto make for you, Child?" The man boomed out.

"Just cereal and bacon," Jim replied.

Chef Roberto shook his head sadly. He pulled out a pack of bacon from his ice cabinet. Each stripe looked so tender and red. "You haven't lived until you tried my scones or omelets. There are crew members on this ship who keep signing on for more trips just to taste my cooking, Child."

Jim laughed and agreed. "Okay."

It turned out Cook Roberto wasn't bragging. When Roberto handed him his tray of food, it really did look delicious. It tasted even better. He had never tasted such light fluffy scones or deliciously rich omelets before. Roberto had come over before he finished eating. He pulled out the chair across from him. He was grinning from eye to eye.

"How was it?" He asked with a twinkle in his eyes.

Jim gave the man a large thumb up. "It was really good," Jim gushed out.

Roberto laughed and patted him hard on the shoulder. His hand was warm and nearly twice the size of his shoulder. Roberto frowned. "You're just skin and bones, Child. Where are your parents? I'm going to give them a piece of my mind." Roberto chided. "You're too skinny, Child. A growing child needs some extra fat. It gives them a healthier tone." Roberto laughed and patted his own belly. He really did remind Jim of Santa Claus.

Jim's face reddened. In Riverside, everyone knew, and never asked. His mother had shielded him from the media when the paparazzi had first shown up on the farm to do their annual interviews on the Kelvin. However, a constantly depressed Federation hero's widow didn't make for a good story. They eventually stopped trying and just started to make up their own stories to over glorify his father's legacy. He remembered being particularly upset by an article about some woman who was bragging about raising 'George Kirk's love child'. Sam had called him a dummy when Jim showed it to him.

"They aren't here," he muttered under his breath.

He saw Roberto's face turn almost scandalous at his reply. He didn't make any further remarks about it. Instead Roberto told Jim some stories about the funniest moments about life on a starship. He had a long luxurious career as a cook, but he couldn't see himself retiring anytime soon. It wasn't until later that Jim noticed that his portions were larger than most of the crew members.

Besides listening to Roberto's stories, he always came over to talk when he wasn't busy making food, Jim spent the remaining time either in the front observation room reading one of his PADDs or exercising in the recreation halls. There was a large assortment of equipment from many different species. Jim only recognized the human and Vulcan gear.

However every time he was reading; a plate of treats courtesy of Chef Roberto would mysteriously appear at some point while he was engrossed in his book. There were simpler desserts like cookies to more intricate desserts like cakes or parfait.

It caused off-duty officers to constantly wander by. He would always offer them some of his treats. Sometimes they accepted and would sit down on the couch across from him. They would ask if he was a passenger in route to Tarsus, and he would nod. Sometimes that was all they would say and then leave soon afterwards. Other times they would tell him about their job on the Republic. He met doctors, engineers, yeomen, security officers, weapon's control operators, science officers and linguistics. The linguistics loved to talk, and some even offered to teach him some rudimentary Vulcan.

If they stayed long enough, they would notice the PADD in his hands and ask what he was reading. He watched their eyes widen when he told them it was Moby Dick. This was the third time he was reading the timeless novel. He noticed that most of the crew members shared that same reaction when he told them.

One lieutenant had laughed when he told him. "The old language is way over my head. I can understand engineering manuals but give me old school literature it's as foreign to me as Klingon is."

"It's poetic." He tried to explain the captain's obsession with finding the whale. Jim loved reading about whales. They were always described as being majestic beings of the sea. It was a shame they had become extinct a long time ago.

The lieutenant laughed and patted his knee. They shared a glass of Viridian apple juice before he left for duty.

It was late in the afternoon when the USS Republic finally entered Tarsus' orbit. Jim was alone on the forward observation deck when Tarsus came into view. He was curled up in one of couches reading a novel from his PADD. He had a nice, large assortment of pastries and juices spread out on the table before him.

The captain made a ship wide announcement that they had entered orbit. Jim pressed his face against the transparent aluminum window. He was not impressed by what he was greeted by. Tarsus was a yellow planet. It seemed to be not even a quarter the size of Earth. The USS Republic seemed to tower over it.

He didn't realize just how yellow Tarsus was until the shuttle touched down on the ground. They didn't allow the civilians to use the transporters. Jim guessed it was because they didn't want to store their imprints in the computer systems.

Tarsus was land of endless sand and nothingness. He should have known considering the universe seemed to love shitting on him. He wondered if it was Frank who had shown his mother the pamphlet. _Fuck._ Frank was probably laughing now about sending Jim to a fucking desert wasteland. There was sand in every direction. Jim couldn't see anything but a sea of yellow. It wasn't that he was expecting rolling, green fields and blue oceans. It was just that he wasn't used to an endless expanse of sand.

There were tiny adobe huts in the distance. He guessed that was where he was going to be living in. An official ushered him into a makeshift tent. There was already long never ending lines of colonists inside. Most looked hot and equally miserable. The air was stuffy inside the tent. It felt like recycled air. There was barely a breeze. He wondered if they knew what they had agreed to. He wondered if any of them had been sent here by a mother who was just too sad or too tired to deal with her child's problems.

Most of the colonists were composed of family units. There were mothers, fathers, children, aunts, uncles and grandparents. It was everything he didn't have. Some of the younglings noticed him. He watched as they pulled at their parents' pants legs. He watched their doting parents bend down. He watched their eyes travel towards him. He shifted his bags and looked away. He tried to blend in with the family in front of him.

He shifted on the balls of his heels. The little boy in front of him looked back at him. He looked to be six-years-old. He remembered being six. Life was simpler back then. The little boy waved at him. "Hi." The boy smiled.

Jim waved back. There was no point in making enemies already. He would probably make many soon anyways. He was good at attracting enemies. "Hi."

Before either one could say anything else, the boy's mother tugged on the boy's arm. She was pretty and young. He remembered when his own mother had looked so young. She had aged fast. The boy tried to pull away but to no avail. The family disappeared into the sea of other families. Jim wondered if he would ever see him again. He moved to a small corner of the tent. There were less people there. He set his bags down on the ground before sitting down in the sand. It was something he was going to have to use to coarse sand. It seemed some things were always constants. He pulled out a PADD to pass the time.

As the hours past, old, decrepit robots rolled past. Most were carrying trays containing finger foods and biodegradable cups containing water. They looked to be the hundred-year-old models like most things here. It matched everything else. Tarsus IV was a fucking hell hole. Jim was amazed that Starfleet had even managed to collect eight thousands colonists to leave wherever the fuck they had come from to settle here. Jim couldn't manage the amount of credit chips that must have been exchanged. Why would anyone bother settling in such a backwater colony? Most importantly how much had Frank made in sending him here?

It was almost night fall when he was finally processed. The personnel at the table looked bored and tired. There was one of those decrepit robots next to him. Its whole 'body' section appeared to be a computer console. Jim had heard about these types of models before. They had been popular in the distant past when humans wanted their computers with them at all times and before the advancements of PADDs that made everything compact and powerful: instant computing at one's finger tips.

The official grabbed his arm a little too roughly. The employee was stabbing him in the arm with a syringe to extract a blood sample before he could even protest. "Fuck," he hissed as he pulled his arm back. "Can't you warn a person?" _Hell, was it even normal to take blood samples of colonists?_

The officer decidedly did not answer. He instead placed the vial in a small machine that was on the table. The machine beeped. The officer blinked at whatever he saw appear on the screen. _Fuck. They didn't fucking just run his genetic code did they? _His genes were fucking hybrid of male and female genes.

Just as Jim was about to comment, the officer slid a PADD thru the machine. It must have downloaded the information into the PADD, which he then handed to him.

Before Jim could even look at it, he was already being waved through. As he was leaving, he saw the officer write something on his PADD. They didn't even bother to ask for his name. He left through the back of the tent. The tent was almost empty by then.

He sat down on a makeshift pile of logs. The first entry in his PADD detailed his living arrangements. He let out a loud whistle. His mother hadn't been joking when she told him that he would be staying with Starfleet officers. One was a botanist, and the other was a social scientist.

There was a map with the location of his foster family's assigned house.

Jim sighed. He threw his bags over his shoulders and made the long walk down the rows of near identical adobe houses. On closer inspection, he noticed that many of the houses had small pots of flowers and bushes on the window ledges and along the pathways to the front door. It seemed to be almost the only source of color in this endlessly yellow land.

The adobe house, which was assigned to his foster family, was located at the intersection of many dirt pavements. The roads all traveled far into the distance. Jim wondered where they all went. He sighed before knocking.

He heard footsteps coming from the inside. The door opened revealing a young, brunette woman. She was dressed in a light spring dress with an apron tied around her waist. There was flour stains on it. She seemed to have been baking.

"You must be the child assigned to us." Jim saw the confusion in her eyes. He obviously wasn't what she had been expecting. He wondered what his mother had said when she 'volunteered' him for Tarsus.

Jim nodded. He handed her the PADD. She looked at it. The frown lines above her eyes became thicker. "Thomas," she shouted.

He heard a large curse followed by something shattering. It sounded heavy. They both cringed. Moment later a young man appeared. The couple seemed to be roughly the same age. She handed him the PADD. "We were expecting a boy," he stated simply before thrusting the PADD back into Jim's hands.

Jim blinked and looked down.

There was a fuzzy picture of an infant on the PADD. He was almost positive it wasn't even him. Besides that, the information was mostly empty minus his hair color, eye color and gender. The word 'female' was circled for gender.

_Fucking hell! _It reeked of Frank's doing. Frank probably had been planning on sending him away for a long time. He should have questioned how everything had come together so easily. He wondered if Sam would have come with him had he not run away. Frank probably would have come up with a way to send them both here even if he hadn't crashed the car and gotten arrested. He just never saw Frank as a hacker. He didn't seem bright enough. He probably paid something to do it for him.

He knew he should march back to the processing center and get it corrected. However, gender in this era was just a word more than anything else. There were many different alien species that didn't fit into the human gender differentiation.

Frank was probably laughing now. Maybe he could just fucking choke to death.

However Jim had always been resourceful, Tarsus was a new beginning. Thanks to fucking Frank, nobody here knew anything about him. Hell, his fucking file was blank. Thanks to his mother, the media never knew what he even looked like.

He could start new here, and it wasn't like he was planning on staying long. Tarsus was starting to feel more and more like Riverside. _Fuck it!_ Tarsus was a hellhole. There was no way he was going to stay here. He was definitely to hitch a ride on any cruiser that would pass by in the future. Besides, he really didn't want to explain why he was bleeding from places he shouldn't be.

"Sorry." The woman said. She glared at her husband before turning around and smiling at him. "What's your name child?" She asked kindly.

"Jane…" The name slipped from his lips. He had seen it tattooed on Big Joe's arm back at that the penitentiary. "Jane Davis."


	5. Chapter 5

**Author's Note:** Sorry, for the delayed post. I'll hopefully get another chapter out before the end of the week.

**Chapter 5**

"I'm Joan Riley, and this is my husband Thomas." She introduced them both before pulling him inside. Thomas took his bags. He shuffled in behind them. He found their home… charming and lived in unlike his own. He knew they hadn't lived here for long. Tarsus IV was a new settlement. They couldn't have arrived more than a week or two before him. However there home more lived in, more loved than his mother or Frank had ever made the Kirk farm in Riverside.

It became obvious fairly soon why Thomas had been decried his stated gender. Joan, not Mrs. Riley, she didn't want to be called Mrs. Riley, she laughed and said it made her old, lead him into the kitchen. She poured him a tall glass of home squeezed lemonade. "It's not really lemonade like on Earth. It's actually genetically different. It's closer to an orange than a lemon," she said as she handed him the glass.

Jim took it willingly. He hadn't realized just how thirsty he was until that moment. It was sweeter and tangier than the lemonade he was used to.

She sat down across from him. She smiled warmly at him while resting a hand under her chin. "Tom, didn't mean it." Like Joan, Tom didn't want to be called Mr. Riley or Thomas. Jim guessed it was so everything would be less formal. They were… fuck… they were his care takers now. His mother had literally given him up besides whatever the fuck Frank had told her to convince her to send him here. It probably didn't take much convincing anyways. She never did raise him. She also never told him how long he supposed to stay on Tarsus. Was he supposed to stay until he was eighteen and was legally an adult and could make his own choices? Was she going to come get him someday? Fuck was she even going to come see him during her next shore leave? "It's just…"

There was a squawk behind him. Jim turned around. Tom was leading a little boy towards them. He saw Joan smile and hold her arms out. It was something he had seen parents at the park in Riverside do. His mother had never done that before. She never gave hugs willing. The little boy ran over to her. She smiled and pulled him into her lap. She placed her chin into his lush, brown hair.

The little boy turned towards him. He had the deepest shade of chocolate brown eyes that Jim had ever seen. "Hi," the boy said shyly. He pushed himself closer into his mother's blossom. "I'm Kevin."

"Hi," Jim flashed Kevin one of brighter, more genuine smiles. I'm Ji…Jane," he said. He mentally cursed himself for almost giving away fake identity. He suddenly wondered if he should have lied about his name or why he didn't correct Frank's horrible 'joke'. It seemed none of the Riley's noticed.

"I'm six-years-old," Kevin parroted out.

Jim smiled. He remembered being six. Life was much simpler back then. Before Frank, before everything else which made him jaded and realize the harsh realities of life.

"Do you want to play a game?"

"Kevin," Joan smoothed out his hair. "It's bed time."

"Aww," Kevin whined.

"Kevin," she said again.

"Alright," Kevin sighed before slipping off of Joan's lap. Joan smiled and gently kissed his cheek. Tom ruffled his hair before he scampered off. Just before he left the room, he turned around and waved to Jim. "We play tomorrow?"

Jim smiled and nodded.

"Yay! 'Night." He disappeared around the corner after that.

Tom had poured his own glass of lemonade by then and taken a seat next to Joan. "You were supposed to share a room with Kevin."

Jim blinked. In that moment he realized. His 'gender' had inconvenienced them. They had been planning on him and Kevin sharing a room. It made sense. As he looked around the tiny eating area, Jim realized just how small the adobe house really was. It was probably just a two bedroom hut. He wondered why they had agreed to take him in to begin with. "It's okay. We can still share."

"That…" Joan started.

Jim waved his hand. "It's okay. Really," Jim smiled and as he rolled his fingers over the glass. Tiny beads of liquid had begun to form over the glass. It was 'sweating' as Sam used to say.

"We did bring that partition from Earth." Tom started.

"My Vulcan painting?" Joan asked. Her eyes widened.

"Is that what it is?" Tom teased.

Joking… they were joking. Jim had never heard grownups jest before. His mother was never happy or around enough. Frank was well… Frank. Joan pushed Tom away as he leaned over to kiss her cheek. Jim looked down. He rolled the glass between his palms. It was awkward. It was strange. _Was this what a family was supposed to be like?_ Tom patted his hand at that moment. Jim looked up.

"Come on. I put your things in the study for now. We can set up the partition tomorrow." Tom stated. Jim nodded. He set the glass down and nodded at Joan.

She smiled and waved at him.

It was a small room. There was a small console in the corner of the room. It was sitting on a rickety wooden table. There was a stack of PADDs next to it. In the opposite corner, there was a small pull out couch that doubled currently as a cot. Tom had already placed his possessions next to it. The cot was covered with a floral bed sheet. There was single pillow that looked hard and a thin blanket.

"There's only one bathroom. We eat breakfast at 0600." Tom stated. He seemed uneasy. Jim wondered if he was used to females beside his wife. _Fuck_. He wasn't even a girl.

Jim nodded. Tom soon disappeared. He waited a while before reaching for his duffle bags. He drew out his PADD. He always read before bed. He felt that if he filled his brain with stories about faraway places and other people's lives, his dreams would be happy. It was a way to trick his brain from giving him nightmares. He had been using the trick for years since he read about how dreams and the brain worked. He wondered if that was why parents read to their children before bed time.

He was so deeply engrossed in his PADD that he didn't hear the door open. He looked up startled when he felt a hand on his arm. He found Kevin's chocolate brown eyes staring up at him. "Mommy, told me to tell you the bathroom is free now," Kevin stated. Jim detected a slight lisp in the boy's words. Kevin would probably grow out of it.

"Thanks." He said nervously. He wasn't used to talking to other boys who didn't want to either beat him up or use him in some way. Sam and Big Joe had been the exceptions. He still didn't understand Big Joe while Sam was his brother.

"Whatcha reading?"

"Treasure Planet." Jim stated.

"Is it for school?"

Jim laughed. "No, it's for fun."

"Fun? Reading isn't fun." Kevin stuck out his tongue.

"'Course it is."

Kevin crossed his arms. "Prove it."

Jim laughed. That wouldn't be difficult. He could already come up with a long list of stories that could easily prove his point. However before he could answer, Joan walked in. She seemed displeased.

"Kevin, it's bed time," she stated. Her voice was firm but lacked the menace that was always in Frank's voice or the lethargic tone of voice from his mother.

Kevin looked up at her. "Aww, Ma, but Jane was going was going to tell me a story."

"Tomorrow Kevin," she drew him close to her blossom.

Kevin pouted but agreed. Joan lightly squeezed his shoulder and whispered a 'good night' to him. He nodded. It was confusing how many times the Riley's said good night to him. The most he got growing up was from Sam who used to punch him in the arm and sarcastically telling him 'good night dummy'.

Breakfast the next morning was simple. It consisted of eggs from the communal chickens, milk from the communal cows and toast from the communal bakery. Jim could the pattern. Everything on Tarsus was communal.

"It's a new colonization. Tarsus could become the framework for the future of the Federation. Every family is assigned a certain task, and all the goods are stored in a common location," Joan explained to him at breakfast. Kevin just nodded along as if he knew what his mother was talking about.

"Joan's a biologist, so we're part of the farming group," Tom added.

"I'm going to grow the biggest pumpkin," Kevin added. Joan smiled and gently ruffled Kevin's brown bangs. "I'm going to win the pumpkin contest at the fall fair."

Tom laughed.

"I'm going to be a biologist when I grow up like Mama."

"Okay Kevin, it's time for school."

"Aww," Kevin whined. He slipped from his chair. He picked up his empty plate and placed it into the kitchen sink.

"Take Jane with you." Tom called. Jim looked up. He hadn't been in school for so long. Not since before Sam ran away, and he crashed his dad's car. He almost opened his mouth to protest. However when Joan smiled at him, he nodded. After he placed his own plate in the sink, he found Kevin at the door lacing up his shoelaces. When he saw Jim, he smiled. He stuck out his hand. Jim guessed Kevin wanted him to take it. Jim toed on his own shoes before taking it. Kevin shouted a 'good-bye' before pulling open the door. They were both greeted with a blast of warm air. It wasn't even summer yet, and it was already hot. Jim wondered just how unbearably hot the summer would be. The Tarsus sun was a great ball of fire in the sky.

"School's on the other side of the settlement," Kevin explained. He skipped along beside Jim. However since Jim didn't know where he was going, he was forced to slow down to let Kevin catch up. Now that it was brighter, he noticed that he had been wrong the night before. All of the adobe houses were identical. There were subtle differences to all the houses. Simple things like window placement and extra rooms.

The school house turned out to be a small one story building next to what he guessed was the government building. He only knew since the building was reminiscent of the old Roman buildings. It was a common theme on Earth. There was large school bell at top. He wondered if it really rang or if it simply for aesthetics. He guessed there weren't many children on Tarsus. It made sense. He couldn't guess how many parents could possibly agree to up root their family for a place like Tarsus.

Kevin tugged on his arm. "Come on, I'll introduce to our teacher. She's really nice."

The teacher ended up being up an old greying woman. She was of Asian descent. Even at the distance, Jim could tell she was once a woman of great importance. She seemed like she had lived a life of excitement and had finally settled down to a quiet life. Jim wondered why she had agreed to teach children.

"Mrs. Kimura," Kevin bolted forward.

"Hello, Kevin," she smiled. Jim recognized the smile immediately. Teachers always smiled to their students like that.

"This is Jane," Kevin quipped. He seemed proud of himself.

Mrs. Kimura looked at him. She bit her lip as if confused before extending her hand.

"Hello, Jane."

Jim took her hand. He was surprised how strong her grip was.

It turned out Mrs. Kimura taught all the students on Tarsus. The inside of the school was just as archaic as the outside. It seemed like it was replicated out from a 19th century history book depiction of a school house. The only difference was that instead of a blackboard in the center of the room there was large outdated holo-screen.

The students were all seated by age groups. The youngest children sat in the front while the older children sat in the back. Kevin sat almost in the front row. He was one of the youngest. There were only a handful of students younger than or just as old as he was. Jim sat closer to the back. It seemed like he was one of the oldest. He sat next to a boy who introduced himself as Thomas Leighton**.** He seemed nervous. Jim watched how he would worry his lip as he took notes in his PADD and would constantly tap his right foot. Jim was tempted to reach over and make him stop. However, he didn't only because he kept him awake. The lectures were long and boring. He forgot how much school had bored him. By the second hour, he had opened up a book on his PADD. He wasn't paying attention when his name was called. He only knew because Thomas had kicked his chair.

"Jane," he hissed.

Jim bolted upwards. Maybe Thomas wasn't that bad.

He wasn't used to the name Jane, or he would have realized he had been called. He heard a soft chuckle transcend the room. "Please answer the question Jane," Mrs. Kimura sighed. It seemed like she had been trying to get his attention for a while.

Jim looked at the holo-screen. It was an easy math question. He had always been good at math. He answered quickly. She smiled and nodded. He wondered if she thought he actually was paying attention.

However there was one lecture that did catch his attention… xenolinguistics. Riverside education was never strong in xenolinguistics. The most he had learned was rudimentary Vulcan. After ten minutes, Jim could tell just how much Mrs. Kimura loved xenolinguistics. Unlike when she was lecturing on math or physics where she talked in a dull, luring monotone voice, there was inflection and excitement as she explained just how important xenolinguistics was. It became fairly obvious that most of the students in the room also had very little exposure to xenolinguistics. By the end of the lecture, he knew more Vulcan than he had in all preceding years of his education.

Lunch was eaten outside in the sand. They were all issued brown biodegradable lunch bags with near identical portions of food. Jim guessed this was part of the communal lifestyle. Thomas invited him to eat lunch with him. He wondered if he should be eating with Kevin, but it seemed Kevin had his own friends. He agreed. They sat with two other boys and two girls of similar age. "We older kids should stick together," Thomas explained.

Jim nodded. The others smiled at him. The girls seemed happy. "It's good to have another girl in our group." She introduced herself as Jennifer Tompkins. She was a pretty black girl with long tresses that cascaded down the side of her face. She nudged the girl next to her. She was an Asian girl with large brown eyes.

"Aiko Kimura," she said. Jim blinked. She laughed. "Yeah, Mrs. Kimura is my great grandmother."

The two boys gave their names next: Eli Molson and Jack… Just Jack. Jennifer and Aiko both groaned. "What, it's not short for Jackson." Jack grumbled.

And that was that. Somehow this became Jim's life. Every day he went to school with Kevin. Every day he ate lunch with Thomas, Jennifer, Aiko, Eli and Jack, and every day after school he worked in the fields with the Riley's. Kevin eventually showed him his prized pumpkin. Jim wondered how Kevin wouldn't win the pumpkin contest. He had never seen a pumpkin that large before.

He had been on Tarsus for nearly a month with Mrs. Kimura asked him to stay after school. Kevin waved at him from the door way before scampering off. They always walked to the fields together. Jim wondered if she was going to reprimand him for his lack of attention during all of his classes minus xenolinguistics. He wondered why it had taken her that long.

She led him to the back room. He wondered how he hadn't noticed it before. He had always assumed it was a broom closet. It turned out to be an ordinary office. He noticed there was a PADD on her desk with pictures that changed.

She told him to take a seat across from the desk. She sat on the other side. He wondered if this is what a teacher/student conference from the past felt like. "I know my classes aren't the most interesting," she started.

Jim grimaced.

"You're obviously very bright," she continued. "One of the brightest students I have ever had."

Jim blinked. He hadn't expected such high praise from anymore. His past teachers had just let him be. He had always scored well on all his tests. Most of the time, he scored the highest in his class. It wasn't difficult. It kept them content. They never wanted to make trouble, not for the dead hero of the Federation. Here on Tarsus, finally he wasn't the son of a dead hero who he had never met.

"You're so much like some of the people I served with in my youth." Mrs. Kimura continued.

Jim blinked. She picked up her PADD. When she turned the PADD around, Jim's eyes widened. Everyone knew about Jonathan Archer's legendary mission aboard the NX-01 Enterprise. In the picture was a picture of the Archer's ship. It seemed to be a publicity picture probably before their maiden voyage. The bridge crew looked stiff unlike in later pictures when they became more at ease with one another. He recognized the Vulcan first officer, T'Pol.

"You're Hoshi Sato. You helped invent the modern universal translator."

She smiled. "Ah yes, the glory days of my youth, yes I am… I was. Now I'm just a lowly school teacher on Tarsus IV with a student who is clearly bored of my teachings."

_Well fuck_.

She laughed. It was startling to watch her laugh now. Jim wasn't sure how he hadn't recognized her. The more he looked at the picture of young Hoshi Sato and the woman she had become; he could clearly see that feisty woman from her youth. She really was the woman who had helped Jonathan Archer during his legendary mission.

"I can see greatness in you, Jane. I've worked with some of the brightest in the galaxy. My little school house just isn't enough for you. You need challenge. Our governor… Kodos… he's a generous man. He's all for helping children grow. He came to me asking for an aide. He wants to groom a child to take over running our colony someday."

Jim blinked.

"I see greatness in you. More greatness than Archer… and well… his history speaks for itself." She laughed. "I want to recommend you for this post."

"I…"

"There is very little I can teach you besides xenolinguistics. It's my only lecture you pay attention too." She tapped her bony fingers on her desk. "What do you say? Governor Kodos could teach you many things. You obviously know your math, science, literature and history."

Jim rubbed his hand over the back of his neck. It did sound more interesting than sitting in class. However… there were his … fuck… his friends. If he agreed, would he see than again? She seemed to notice his hesitation.

"It will initially only be for a few hours every week until you are older and if you really want to pursue this path."

"Okay." Jim nodded. _Why not?_ It wasn't like he was signing his life away.

Only as he leaving the school house, did he stop and wonder. When did he stop wanting to leave Tarsus? When did Tarsus start feeling like… home?

**Author's Note: **I guess this is the calm before the storm chapter. I really do feel bad for what happens to most of these characters...

I'm also not sure if Kevin Riley's parents were part of Starfleet, or what they did. Canon seemed to imply Jim and Kevin knew each other on Tarsus.

Various Star Trek Encyclopedia sites claimed that Hoshi Sato was on Tarsus IV with her family, so I decided why not let her and Jim meet. Jim clearly knows something about xenolinguistics when he first meets Uhura in the bar. Who could be a better teacher right? It also claims that Sato married later in life.

However since I haven't watched very much of Enterprise, and by not much I mean 2 normal episodes and the mirror universe episodes, I don't know much about Hoshi Sato's characterization. I plan on watching more Enterprise before Archer shows up though.

As for Jim's apprenticeship with Kodos... well... we'll see where that goes.


	6. Chapter 6

**Chapter 6**

Jim would never forget the first time he met Governor Kodos. There were some things in life that just leaves a deep imprint, and this was one of them even discounting the things to come. Things at that point in time, nobody could have imagined.

Kodos accepted Mrs. Kimura's recommendation. She asked him to stay after class a week later. She handed him a PADD with a generic congratulatory letter followed by a statement that he would be contacted soon, which ended up being a whole month later. Naturally, his friends found out about it. News traveled fast in a small town. However, Jim didn't doubt that Mrs. Kimura didn't mention it at home, and Aiko just overheard. They teased him relentlessly at first.

"You better not forget about us Jane." Thomas had said.

"I heard they get better food," Jack added. Jack wasn't a fan of communal food. "It's like a cafeteria without choices." Everyone ate the same food every day, and there was only so many ways to cook potatoes or broccoli.

Eli punched Jack in the arm. "That's stupid." Eli's mother worked in the government building. She was a receptionist. Eli was infatuated by politics and its intricacies. Jim could tell that Eli was still annoyed that Mrs. Kimura hadn't chosen him for the apprenticeship.

Jennifer, always the diplomatic, simply stated "Mrs. Kimura didn't even choose Aiko. It's not like Jane actively lobbied, and you can't deny she isn't smart."

"Seriously, she never pays attention in class and always gets the best scores," Thomas added. They still sat next to each other in class. Thomas would always kick Jim's chair if Mrs. Kimura called on him, which had gotten rarer and rarer over time. Jim always knew the answers despite never paying attention. He only paid attention during xenolinguisitics, and even in that subject he was better than anyone else in the class.

That stopped Eli from grumbling further. He couldn't deny that Jim wasn't brilliant and didn't deserve it.

The invitation was sent through the PADD that contained the initial introduction and congratulatory letters. It came in the morning as he was getting ready for school. By then he had been sharing a room with Kevin for nearly two months. He hadn't realized just how much of a hindrance sharing a room was. The partition helped; however, Kevin had the uncanny ability to suddenly appear on his side of the partition. To prevent awkward questions, he started sleeping with his clothes on and changing in the bathroom. He had forgotten about that PADD by then. He only glanced at it that morning since he was running late and had accidentally knocked over his stack of PADDs as he was grabbing the ones for class.

He blinked at the words that appeared on the screen: 'new message'. It was first time the PADD had received anything. He read the message quickly. It was a simple, short message requesting his presence at a gala function in celebration of a successful planting and settlement season. He was even scheduled for an appointment with the settlement's tailor. "Fuck me," Jim muttered tossing the PADD back on the desk.

When he appeared for breakfast, it seemed both Joan and Tom had already been notified. They weren't political people. They were simple Starfleet officers. Jim had realized within the first week. They weren't like his mother who had climbed high in the ranks of Starfleet, or his father who was one of the youngest first officers and acting captains before his untimely death. It seemed not everyone in Starfleet was ambitious.

They told him to have fun and don't feel intimidated.

"Don't forget to still be a kid," Joan said as she passed him his cereal.

"Nobody is forcing you to grow up," Thomas added. His initial trepidation had long evaporated.

When he arrived at the tailor after school, he had come up with a thousand different excuses for not wearing a dress. He was not going to wear one of those frilly dresses with lace and trimmings that his cousins and aunts wore. Even his mother wore one long ago. He had seen his parents' wedding picture.

He was greeted by an aging old lady. She was wearing a pair of large specs. It surprised Jim. Nobody wore glasses anymore. She clicked her teeth together at the sight of him. "Jane Davis?" she asked. She seemed annoyed as if he was taking up her time.

Jim nodded.

"You're late. I don't like my clients to be late."

He glanced at the clock. He was barely a minute late. He almost opened his mouth to protest but decided against it. He was in her territory now. She studied him for a long period of time. She circled him as if he was animal or a car for purchase, or maybe more appropriately a piece of artwork to be admired and critique. She clicked her teeth together.

"A little scrawny." She tapped his shoulder blades.

He let out a startled cry when she unrolled a measuring tape around his chest. She seemed most displeased when she read the numbers.

"They always give me the hardest cases." She sighed before rolling the tape measure back up. "A diamond in the rough, they don't call me a visionary for nothing." She stepped in front of him. She placed her hand under his chin and tilted his neck back. She rotated his head back and forth. He wondered what she was looking for. "It's okay sweetheart. Mademoiselle Turner will make you into a princess." She smiled, revealing a set of perfectly straight pearl white teeth.

He most decidedly was not going to be a princess.

She pulled back.

"You have stunning blue eyes. I think a blue dress." She twirled around on the balls of her high heels. She looked like a woman on a mission or even a lion about to pounce on its prey.

It would be the train wreck of all train wrecks. "I would rather wear slacks." Jim countered.

She pivoted back around. She narrowed her eyes. "That's highly… inappropriate for such an occasion." She looked physically wounded. "I make the best dresses. Everyone in the Federation wants my dresses."

Jim was tempted to ask how she ended up on Tarsus IV then of all places. Tarsus was definitely not a place for a tailor. Tarsus was hot, dusty, and everything inevitably became covered in sand. Everyone wore thin layers of clothes that could be washed and dried easily in the baking hot sun.

He instead countered with a more diplomatic approach. "Even in Starfleet, men have the option of wearing dresses for their uniforms. Why can't I have the same option?"

The tailor blinked at him before laughing. "Clever child, I can see why they want you. Alright, a nice blue tie and a black, striped suit, the nice traditional choice, it seems to suit you."

She drew him to off shoot room. There were mirrors on three of the four walls. His blazing blue eyes, dirty blond hair, and lanky body were projected on all three mirrors. He had been avoiding looking at himself in the mirror for almost his entire life. Now, standing in that room as the tailor wandered off to find a suit for him he became aware of all of his imperfections. He tugged at the collar of his t-shirt. The scars that extended throughout his back peeped out. They were the scars that he had received from Frank before he started fighting back.

Tailor Turner returned moments later. She was carrying a large stack of clothes. "Put them on," she said simply. She hung the clothes on the clips that extended along the one wall without a mirror before leaving. Jim ran his fingers through the clothes. They were better than any clothes he had ever own before. They were better than even the clothes that his mother used to dress him in on Sundays and for special occasions. There were blue sequins embedded into the cuff links of the suit. There was an intricate design embroidered into the blue tie.

The pants and undershirt fit almost perfectly. The jacket was near perfect. He did struggle with the tie. It seemed by then Mrs. Turner must have grown impatient for she burst into the room. She seemed to flash ten shades of happiness when she saw him. She clapped her hands delightfully. "Yes, yes… almost perfect."

He wasn't sure how she measured perfection. He ended up staying at the tailor shop for hours. Fuck, by the time she was finally satisfied, the suit that he ended up with was almost nothing like the one he had initially tried on. The only thing that stayed constant was the color of the suit and the tie.

It was nightfall when she finally let him leave his shop. "You'll be the star of the party, child," she said proudly. He didn't want to star in any party. In fact, he didn't even want to go anymore. He was tried from standing. He just wanted to go to sleep.

When he finally reached Kodos' residence, he was surprised how large and different it was from the other residences on Tarsus. Instead of all the other houses that were made from a mixture of clay and sand, this house seemed to be made from brick and steel building structures. It looked like it had been transported straight from Earth. The closer he got the clearer the differences became. Fuck… there was even a swimming pool in the backyard. It was a fucking 'pool party'.

Before he could even knock on the door, it opened for him. There was a man at the door. He seemed displeased. He was holding a PADD. He looked at Jim with his beady, black eyes. "Jane?" He stated more than ask.

"Yes?"

"You're late."

"Sorry?"

"Governor Kodos does not like tardiness." He stated. "Come."

Jim nodded.

"I am Taylor Smith, our gracious governor's first aide."

Jim was tempted to ask if Kodos had more aides.

He was lead through the house. It was actually more of a mansion. It reminded him of the old houses from the 18th century plays that he read. There was even replicated vintage furniture in almost every room. He could identify the stark resemblances to the Shakespearean plays that he had read. He wondered if Kodos was a fan of Shakespeare. Hell, there was even a drawing room with a grand piano in the center.

He was lead thru the back door and into the outdoors patio where the swimming pool was. There were lanterns hanging on all the arches. There was a large grill in the center where stacks of steaks, pork, chicken, fish and a wide assortment of vegetables were currently cooking. He wondered where this food came from. It is vastly different from the daily communal rations that all the families were assigned every day. It looked so delicious and juicy though. He wasn't sure when the last time he had steak was. There were small groups of people standing and talking together in the backyard. They all looked like important people. He never felt more out of place.

"Come. Governor Kodos particularly want to meet you again." The aide set his hand on Jim's shoulder and directed him to the back of the garden.

Unlike all the other faceless people, as they approached the main table, Jim could immediately pick out who was Kodos without being introduced. Kodos was a man of presence. He was one of those men who filled whatever room he was in. He was wearing a deep blood red suit that clashed dramatically with his receding red hair. His red mustache curled into two sharp red tips. He was currently engaged in an animated conversation with a dainty woman in a pale purple strapless dress.

The aide pulled him to a halt before they reached the table. He cleared his throat. Kodos looked up. He looked annoyed. "Governor," he stated.

Kodos blinked. "Yes…" He waved his hand.

"I brought your newest protégé…"

Kodos looked at him. He looked at him with his dark brown eyes. They seemed to be peering deep into his soul. They reminded him so much of Frank in so many ways that he wanted to step back, say he changed his mind, and run away. Kodos smiled at him, or what Jim guessed could pass as a smile.

"Jane," Kodos said enthusiastically. He pushed the woman who he was talking to away before standing up. "Of course." His smile widened. "Come, sit, dine with me." He placed his hand on the chair that his female companion had vacated. He patted the cushion. The aide pushed his forward.

"Don't keep the governor waiting," he hissed.

Jim stumbled in his dress shoes at the force. However he managed to catch himself. It seemed nobody noticed. He slipped into the chair. Kodos smiled. "Would you like something to drink?"

"Err…"

"Fetch us two wines." He snapped his fingers. Jim wondered how any of the waiters could possibly hear. It seemed the aide wondered the same thing. So when Kodos' eyes narrowed and snapped his finger again before speaking, this time his voice was less pleasant. "Well, wine."

The aide nodded. His face turned a bright, tomato shade of red. The aide must have suddenly realized that Kodos was addressing him. Jim watched him disappear into the crowd. Jim felt Kodos place his hand on his shoulder. Even through the many layers of cloth Kodos' hand felt cold. He looked up at Kodos. Kodos smiled down at him. "How are you enjoying the party?"

"It's … pleasant, especially the food."

Kodos laughed. "Yes, the food is grand."

"Not at all like the communal food," Jim added.

"No, of course not, I had it shipped from Earth." Kodos smiled. It didn't reach his eyes though. "And my house?"

"It's very large."

"You're not very direct."

"I..."

Kodos smiled, revealing a set of pearly white teeth. They were so sharp like crocodile teeth. Kodos set his hand on Jim's arm. It was so large and massive over Jim's own thin, scrawny arm. Despite the padding in his suit, he still felt small and insignificant. "I like that." He patted his arm again. "I've been assured by many people here that you are the smartest child here. That you will make a fine replacement when I'm too old to lead our colony."

Jim wasn't sure how to respond. He had never been praised so highly.

"My house… it's inspired by an old Shakespearean play…"

"Macbeth." The word slipped from Jim's lips before he could stop it.

He saw Kodos' eyes widen. "My, my… I have never met a child or even many adults in this day and age who still knows the classics. Have you read many? I have a whole library of books. Come," Kodos grabbed Jim's arm and literally pulled him up. It seemed only then that Kodos noticed what he was wearing. "How ever did you manage to convince our divine tailor to let you come in a suit? She loves her dresses."

Jim shrugged. "It wasn't hard."

"You are a smart child." At that moment, the aide returned bearing two large wine glasses. Kodos plucked them from the aide's hands and waved him away lazily. Jim watched him march away. He saw the lingering hatred in his eyes that was directed at him. He guessed he had just made his first enemy. He had lasted longer than ever before.

Kodos maneuvered him along. He was a graceful man. Jim could easily see how he had risen to the position he was currently holding. He was young and ambitious. Kodos led him back into his house. They stopped in the drawing room where the grand piano was. "My mother used to play when I was a child. Do you play?"

Jim shook his head. His grandmother used to play. She tried teaching him when he was little. He was too impatient to sit on the bench for long, so she gave up. Sam, Sam who was always more patient than he was, learned to play beautifully, but that was before Frank. Before Sam started lashing out at the world, before he ran away from home.

"That's too bad." Kodos grip tightened. "Maybe, we could find someone to teach you. "A successful ruler needs to be well versed." Later, Jim would wonder why at that moment when Kodos said 'ruler', it didn't cause warning lights to flash through his head. Maybe it was the wine he was sipping. It was making his head dizzy, or maybe it was the lights. They were so hot and stifling.

Kodos glided him along. They stopped in front of a set of double oak doors. Kodos seemed to positively radiate with excitement. "This is my favorite room in the house. I hope someday you will also grow to love it." He pressed his hand against the sensor. Jim watched as it lit up. It was almost as if it was the ancient meeting the present. The sensor lit up. The doors swung open.

Jim let out a large gasp. Within the room were rows and rows of books… real books. Jim had never seen a real book before. Everything he had read he had downloaded onto his PADD. Kodos set his hand on Jim's shoulder. "This is my collection. It holds the wonders and secrets of the past."

Jim couldn't think of a response.

Kodos led him inside. It seemed Kodos had a purpose. They walked through many aisles before stopping at a bookshelf crammed full of large tombs. Kodos reached for a book. It was large and thick. There was a picture of a man during one of the darker days of Earth's history. "Adolf Hitler, he's a great and powerful man."

Great was not the word Jim would use to describe Hitler. History described Hitler as anything but great.

"He was a visionary. He believed in the creation of a superior race. What do you think about a world where only the best, the strongest, and the brightest live?" Kodos asked. He seemed to be positively fondling the book. "Don't you grow tired of talking to the average person? They don't understand us. They only pull us back, prevent us from reaching our fullest potential."

Kodos seemed to be positively glimmering with excitement as if he had met a kindred spirit. At that moment, Jim should have grown concerned, but the wine was so strong, and Kodos' voice was smoothing as he started reading passages of Hitler's words.

By the end of summer, Jim found himself spending more and more time in Kodos' library of ancient treasures. There were many days when he wouldn't return to the Riley's house. One of Kodos' servants would set a plate of food outside the library for him. He ate lavishly. It seemed Kodos wasn't subjugated to the same communal food supply as everyone else in the colony.

So, when he finally did wander into the Riley's house and found Kevin crying, he really had no idea. The little boy was all alone. He wondered where his parents had gotten to. They rarely left him alone.

Jim sat down beside the boy. "Kevin, what's wrong?" He really wondered if Kevin would tell him. He had been spending so much time at Kodos' mansion that they never really formed a strong bond. Kevin still asked him to read him bedtime stories the nights that he did come back tho. Kevin had long conceded the point that books weren't boring.

Kevin let out a sob before looking up at Jim. "My pumpkin," he muttered.

Jim blinked, confused. "What happened to your pumpkin?"

"It's sick," Kevin let out a larger sob. "Mommy says we have to cut it off. It's dying."


	7. Chapter 7

**Chapter 7 **

And that was the start of the beginning of the end.

Kevin's pumpkin was just the beginning.

Jim wrapped his arms around the little boy. He gave him a tissue to blow his nose with. Kevin's eyes were still red. There were still long trails of tears that ran down the side of his face.

"Can I see?" Jim asked.

Kevin nodded his head miserably. For once, Kevin wasn't bouncing along as they made the long trek to the fields outside the settlement. Kevin dragged his feet along. He kicked up a storm of dust in his wake.

The sight of the fields surprised Jim. Since his apprenticeship with Kodos, he hadn't been working in the fields. What had once been a field of green, strong plants was now a sea of yellow and brown with sparse traces of green. Everything looked to be in varying degrees of wilting or dying, and Jim was positive it wasn't due to a lack of rain.

He remembered that one year, years ago when a plague hit the Kirk farm in Iowa. His mother was off world then. It was just him, Sam and their ranch hands. They thought they would lose the whole harvest. It had taken a miracle concoction to save the harvest. That was also the first time Sam showed interest in microbiology. Sam had shadowed the whole process. He spent hours in the makeshift laboratory located in the back of the barn. He hadn't seen Sam for days. He had also never seen Sam so proud before than when the harvest became healthy again. Jim suddenly wished Sam was with him. He hadn't thought about his brother in a long time.

Kevin led him to his prized pumpkin. Jim drew a breath. Since he had been on Tarsus, he was positive he had never seen the pumpkin this small before. It wasn't even half the size it had been at the beginning of summer. Its normally green leaves were curled in on itself. Its once lush orange tone now looked like week old burnt wax.

Jim set his hand on Kevin's shoulder. Kevin curled his fingers around Jim's shirt. They stood there for a long time looking at the sick pumpkin.

It was a long time later that Kevin tugged on his shirt. "Jane?"

"Hmm," Jim whispered. He looked down at the little boy. Kevin stared up at him with his large, chocolate brown eyes.

"Do you think Governor Kodos could help?"

Kodos… Kodos with his library of books filled with knowledge of the ages… Kodos who was breeding him to talk over someday… Kodos who saw him as something worth wide. Kodos who knew some of the smartest scientists in the Federation. Jim smiled. "Of course." Jim nodded. Kodos had to care about the settlement.

However the next day when he arrived at Kodos' office for his lesson, his aide, it was a different aide than the one he had met at the party, told him Kodos was away and would be away for at least a week or two. The aide handed Jim a PADD and showed him out the door.

It wasn't until a week later that the effects became apparent. It started off as small changes. They were barely noticeable. There were fewer choices during the daily ration allocation. Instead of different vegetables for lunch and dinner, it became the same vegetable.

However it wasn't until Kevin muttered, "Why we have to eat lettuce again," that Jim realized. He had used to very little variety growing up. There were only so many dishes that the food synthesizer on the ranch could make and even less that were actually functioning. He was used to eating the same meals for days on end. He had been surprised the first time Joan set dishes with varying taste and a wide variety of spices in front of him.

"Eat your greens, Son," Thomas muttered.

Jim had to stifle back a smile when Kevin stuck out his tongue in disgust. "I hate lettuce," he muttered under his breath.

It was two weeks later. He had already dozed off when he felt a warm body entangle himself around his waist. Jim immediately snapped opened his eyes, and his breath quickened. He wasn't used to physical contact. His heart stopped pounding as fast when he realized it was Kevin. The little boy had curled himself against Jim.

"Kevin?" He said. His words slurred from being pulled from sleep.

"Jane, I'm hungry," Kevin whispered.

Jim could feel and hear his own stomach grumble. "You'll be less hungry when you're asleep," Jim muttered back.

Kevin shook his head. "No, I just start dreaming about blueberry pie." Kevin whispered back. "Mommy makes the best blueberry pie," Kevin added as if it was an after though.

"Hmm," Jim whispered. He was already starting to slip back to sleep. He felt Kevin grab his pajama top and gently shake it. Jim reached up and lightly rested his hand on Kevin's. "Hmm," he muttered again.

"I hungry, tell me a story," Kevin whined again.

"Ok," Jim muttered, he was still towering between sleep and wakefulness. "Have you heard the story about stone soup?"

"Stone soup?" Kevin blew a raspberry. "That sounds gross."

Jim laughed. "No, it's really the best soup ever."

"Better than Mommy's?"

Jim laughed. "Hmm, that's hard. Probably…"

Kevin pulled on his sleeve. "Tell the story, Jane. Please."

Jim laughed. "Okay, once upon a time…"

Kevin sat up and crossed his arms.

"What?" Jim asked.

"This isn't a girly story, right?"

"Huh?"

"Only girly stories start with 'once upon a time'."

Jim laughed and gently punched him in the shoulder. "No, Kevin, it's not a 'girly' story." He felt himself air quoting as he said the words 'girly'. He rolled his eyes. "Now, do you want to hear or not? If not, I'm going back to sleep." Jim feigned pulling his blanket up. Kevin immediately grabbed his arm.

"Please tell me the story."

Jim pretended to sigh in defeat. "Okay. Like I was saying before I was soo rudely interrupted." He rolled his eyes at Kevin. He looked back at Jim guiltily. Jim patted the space next to him. It was a small cot, but both he and Kevin were small and skinny. They both easily fit. Kevin immediately climbed under the sheets and lay down. "Once upon a time there was a wandering traveler…"

"… The traveler smiled as he filled his bowl with another helping of stone soup. He knew every one in the village was thinking the same thing. It was the best soup they had ever tasted," Jim whispered. He looked over at Kevin. He could tell from his shallow breathing that he had long fallen asleep. There was a smile on his face as he clenched the hem of Jim's t-shirt.

He hoped Kevin was having happy dreams. Tomorrow… tomorrow Kodos was returning. He was going to tell Kodos that the villagers were hungry and to redistribute the rations.

The next morning, Jim received a message on his PADD from Kodos telling him to keep up his reading and music. He had finished the reading weeks ago and as for music… well Jim… his piano skills weren't anything to be proud of.

Kodos had been back for a month.

In that time, it seemed the portions were getting smaller, and the options were became a thing of the past. Soon breakfast, lunch and dinner all consisted to rice, lettuce and a small serving of meat. The meat was never recognizable.

"It's dog," Jack stated. It had been a long time since Jim saw his friends. They had all been working long hours in the fields. The fields were getting sicker and sicker by the day. However they still tried.

He heard Kevin draw a long breath. Kevin had been following Jim around lately. His mother was working longer and longer hours at the laboratory. She and two other biologist sent by Starfleet were still attempting to find the all allusive cure. While his father was in daily meetings, meetings which Jim was banned from attending.

"That's stupid," Eli retorted. "There is no way we are eating dog."

"Well it sure ain't cow or pork." Jack poked at his sandwich.

Thomas rolled his eyes. "Well, if you don't want it give it here." He stuck out his hand expectedly.

"I never said I didn't want it," Jack said hurriedly. "I was just commenting."

"Well, we don't want to hear your stupidity," Jennifer bristled.

"Yeah, it could be…people!" Thomas yelled.

Kevin screamed and buried himself into Jim's chest. Jim glared at Thomas.

"Sorry," he said sheepishly.

Kevin tugged at his t-shirt. Jim looked down. "It's not really people, is it?" Kevin whispered back. Kevin wasn't good at whispering, so he was sure his friends heard. He saw how both Thomas and Jack's lips twitch. At least they were decent enough not to laugh.

"No, of course," Jim stated. There was no way Kodos was going to feed them people but most importantly it wasn't like people were missing or dying in the settlement yet.

"Well, whatever it is. It tastes funny," Jack added. He fiddled with his sandwich.

"Everything tastes funny to you." Eli rolled his eyes.

"When you going to see Gov. Kodos again Jane?" Jennifer stated.

"Hopefully tomorrow. He's been really busy. They are probably trying to find a way to fix it."

"Mommy says it's a virus," Kevin added helpfully. "She says she's never seen such a vir… vir…."

"Virulent?" Aiko supplied. She was always good at vocabulary. There were words that she knew that Jim had never even seen before.

"Yeah that," Kevin nodded. "Virulent strand."

Eli punched Jack in the arm. "See, I told you the government will help us."

Jack just rolled his eyes. "Whatever. My uncle says we should abandon the settlement and contact the Federation for help."

"Gov. Kodos is Federation," Eli retorted.

"More useful Federation," Jack replied. "It ain't right. They should have sent Starfleet by now."

"Gov. Kodos will fix it. We got to show the Federation we can be independent and self sufficient."

Thomas laughed. "Where'd you hear such nonsense from?"

"Sensible people," Jack stated.

Maybe that day Jack was right. Maybe they should have all started wondering why Starfleet hadn't been called in for evacuation or at least sent relief forces. However, human nature rarely works in such a way. Even after hundreds of years of evolution and social change, there were some things that were even harder to change than racial and social prejudices.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Kevin turned eight at the beginning of October. It had been two months since the day Jim found Kevin crying about his sick pumpkin. It had been two months since he last saw Governor Kodos. Jack was insistent that something was wrong, that the federation should have came by now.

When the food rations plummeted further by the end of September even Eli's firm belief that Kodos was going to save them was slipping.

Jim wasn't sure he had ever been so hungry. Every night he went to the bed with a half empty stomach. Initially he thought that Joan and Tom would stop feeding him as well to save for Kevin. Frank would have, but for himself, but they never did. They gave him fair portions.

However Kevin was a growing boy who always got seconds and third helpings. Jim was used to going to bed hungry growing up with frank. There were many days when Frank would refuse to let him get food out of the food synthesizer.

Thus, Jim frequently found himself breaking his bread in half and slipping half onto Kevin's plate. The first time he did it. Kevin looked at him with wide eyes. Jim just winked and mouthed 'secret'.

Kevin shook his head and refused to eat it. Jim was certain Joan or Tom would scold him. However they both seemed tired. Their minds were deep in thought. In the end, Jim took it back. However he didn't eat it. He slipped it into his pants pocket and that night when Kevin slipped into his bed; Jim gave it to him. This time he ate it willingly.

It had become an almost nightly ritual after that night Jim told him the story of stone soup. Sometimes Jim would tell him a story while other times he was sing ancient lullabies. They were the only ones he knew. Their android nursemaid had been programmed with only ancient music. Jim guessed that attributed to his love for century music and stories.

The only positive factor Jim found from never eating enough was he had stopped his monthly bleeding. It was a horrible silver lining but a silver lining never the less. It was the first time since his thirteenth birthday when he didn't have to feel a uterus he wasn't even supposed to have contract. It wasn't like he was ever going to use it. He had already decided he was never going to have children. His genes were defected. He never wanted to subjugate anyone to them.

The morning of Kevin's eighth birthday, Jim found Joan in the kitchen. He smelt something heavenly, and he almost thought that the last two months had been a horrible nightmare or that Kodos or even the rest of the Federation had brought deliverance.

When he walked into his kitchen, he almost backed away. He hoped she didn't see him. He doubted he would ever forget the image before him as long as he lived. The only thought which ran through his mind was... 'Fuck Jack was right. Jack had been right.'

He found himself heaving out bile, stomach acid, and salvia into the sand behind the house. Kodos... He had to see Kodos. There was no way Kodos knew. He couldn't know, or he would have done something... anything.

"Jane?"

Jim looked up. It was Kevin. He was still dressed in his pajamas. He was calling from the bedroom window. That meant he hadn't left the room. He hadn't seen his mother in the kitchen... Cooking... Jim felt his stomach churn again.

"Jane?" Kevin asked again. He was worried. He looked worried.

Jim wiped his mouth with the back of his wrist. He forced a smile on his face. "'Morning birthday boy."

A smile appeared on Kevin's face. "Mommy promised a big cake and a party."

Jim tried to smile. Sometimes... Sometimes ignorance really was bliss. "That's nice."

Despite the lack of food and the cake that Jim couldn't bring himself to eat, this was the best birthday party he had ever been to. His birthdays had always been a sad day for his mother. When he was younger, she used lock herself in her bedroom. Once he had opened the door and saw her sobbing into a PADD containing the picture of his father. He heard her whispering, "I'm sorry George. I'm so sorry." He never could figure out what she was sorry for. Sam's birthdays were better and actually celebrated. However his mother never baked even Sam a birthday cake in his living memory, maybe she had when Sam was younger.

In place of lavish food, they played many old games: charades, pin the tail on the donkey, and even break the piñata which wasn't filled with candy.

After the guests left and it was just Jim, Kevin, Joan and Tom, they sat on the porch each nursing glasses of water. Water was the only commodity that there was still plenty of it. It was ironic. On a desert planet, the only abundance left was water. Tom handed Kevin his birthday present. Kevin took it excitedly. It was wrapped in brown parchment paper. It was a small package unlike some of the other gifts Kevin had received. The biggest was the newest model of the hover bike. Kevin had already extracted promises from both Tom and Jim to teach him to ride without training wheels. He was a big boy now. He was eight-years-old.

He tore the wrapping paper with gusto. It was a small box. It looked like a jewelry box. When Kevin flipped open the box, it revealed an old pocket watch. Jim had only read about them in books and old holo videos he used to watch. Even Kodos with his love of antiques didn't have one in his vast collection.

Kevin looked at it quizzically. He shook it. Jim cringed when he heard its inner workings rattle around. Luckily Tom reached over and placed his hand over his son's.

"Careful Sport. You'll break it."

"It already sounds broken."

Tom laughed. Jim could see laugh lines appear around his eye lids. "It's a pocket watch. It helps you tell time."

Tom reached around Kevin's waist and flipped open the lid. Jim immediately recognized that the face of the watch was made from mother of pearl. The numbers were engraved in gold lettering. The hands were made from sheets of gold. Even though in present day, gold was no longer a rare commodity. Hell the Ferengi even enclosed their prized latinum in it. Jim knew in the year it was made that gold was expensive and precious though.

There was an old, nearly faded picture of a young woman on the side of the watch. She was pretty especially by past standards. Her fiery red hair was knotted onto a bun. She had large chocolate brown eyes.

"Who's that?" Kevin asked.

"She's your great, great, great, great grandmother. Your grandfather carried his watch with him during the Great War. He believed as long as this watch ticked, he would come home to her."

Kevin made a face. "That sounds like one of Jane's stories."

Both Tom and Joan laughed. It really did.

That was the last good night they had together. The next morning Jim and Kevin woke up to discover the doctor in Joan and Tom's bedroom.

Jim saw her figure thru the doorway of the master bedroom. She looked so pale and frail lying in a sea of blankets and pillows. Her night gown hung loose on her body. He saw a bowl by the foot of the bed. It contained bloody sheets and bloody clothes. Jim knew what it meant. He had seen it many times in the first two years of his mother's marriage to Frank.

The doctor must have seen the recogniation in his eyes. It was rare to nonexistent in this era of modern medical advancements. In some ways, it made become more of an embarrassment when it did occur than ever before.

Jim drew Kevin close to his chest before pulling the door shut. Jim and Kevin sat on the doorstep. Jim drew circles in the sand with a stick. Kevin sat next to him. It looked so miserable.

"Jane," his voice sounded so strained. Jim could see the tear stains on his cheeks. At that moment Jim wondered if he would be as sad if it was his mother.

"Hmm."

"What happened to your parents?"

It wasn't the question Jim was expecting. Nobody had asked about his parents since he arrived, and he never offered to tell them.

"My mom is out sailing thru in the stars. She's an officer on starship."

"My uncle is in Starfleet too. Daddy says it makes my aunt sad."

"Yes, Starfleet does break many families."

Kevin placed his hand on his knee. "What about your daddy?"

Jim sighed. Nobody asked his dad. The whole Federation knew his story. Jim was tempted to say so, but Kevin didn't know who he really was. Here, here he wasn't Jim Kirk, son of a Federation hero. "My dad died a long time ago," Jim answered simply.

"Will my mommy die?"

"No," Jim stated. "Not today. If that doctor can't help her, then..."

At that moment the door opened. Both Jim and Kevin bolted upwards. The doctor stepped out. He didn't make eye contact with either of them.

Tom was leaning against the door. His arms were behind his back. Kevin ran to him. Tom wrapped his arms around his son. "Mommy?"

"She'll be fine, Kevin. The doctor said she'll be fine."

Jim heard him draw a breath. Jim didn't follow when Tom drew his son back into the house. Despite the Riley's welcoming him into their home, in some ways they treated him more like their own than his mother ever had. However, he was still an outsider. He would always be an outsider. However, this… this he could do to return the kindness.

He ran to Kodos' mansion. He had to know. He had to call for help. Jack was right. Whatever the government was doing, it wasn't helping. It was too big for them. They were starving. They were starving in a world where food synthesizers existed... where starvation had long been solved.

He crashed through Kodos' house. He pushed through the door man who chased him through the hallways. He had always been fast. Living with Frank taught him how to be fast.

Kodos was sitting in his study. He was reading one of his books. His expression didn't even change to show concern or surprise at Jim's unexpected entrance. "In heavens name child, what is wrong?"

Jim collapsed onto Kodos' desk. He let out large rasping breaths. He wasn't used to running so fast anymore. There was no Frank to run away from anymore. "Please, please call Starfleet. Everyone is starving." He felt like he was ranting and raving.

Kodos stood up. He placed his book on the desk. There was a picture of Napoleon on the cover. He wrapped his arms around him. "Leave us."

Jim heard the door man back away and pulled the door shut.

"Little Jane," Kodos stated. He rubbed his fingers thru his cheeks. Jim flinched. "There is nothing to fear."

"But... Kevin's mom just lost her baby."

"Joan Riley?"

"Yes." Jim nodded.

"Oh child. That is a horrible thing to see." He patted his head. He smoothed his bangs. His hair was getting longer. "There is nothing to fear. We have plan. A new era starts soon..."

Because Jim was so hungry, and at thirteen he really couldn't rationalize all the horrors of the world, Jim believed. He believed the words Kodos told him.


	8. Chapter 8

**Chapter 8 **

"It'll be okay child. You'll see. I have a plan, a plan to save us."

Jim nodded. His stomach grumbled at that moment. Kodos smoothed down his hair. He hadn't had time to get ready this morning. "Come. Let's get you something to eat. And a bath and some clothes," Kodos added.

Jim nodded. He really was hungry. It had been weeks since he had eaten enough food to feel even marginally full especially after he started splitting his meager portions with Kevin.

Kodos led him to his kitchen. Jim's eyes widened. His grandmother had a kitchen like this. He remembered spending the holidays there when he was little before his mother started taking longer and longer missions. Then it was just Jim, Sam and their android caretaker before Frank came along.

It was easy to see that before the famine; this kitchen had been a lively place. Jim could easily surmise that this was where most of the food for Kodos' dinner parties had been prepared at.

Kodos pressed him into a chair. Maybe Kodos pushed a little too hard, or maybe Jim was just that weak. Whatever was the reason? When Kodos left him at the breakfast table to make his food, Kodos' large handprint was left on his shoulder. It throbbed as much as his head did.

Jim watched as Kodos made him a sandwich: peanut butter and jelly. His mom had made that for him once when he was little. She called it comfort food like chicken noodle soup. He watched as Kodos cut the crust off before slicing the sandwich into equal triangles. His mother had never sliced the crust off his sandwiches. She was always in too much of a hurry to care about the little things.

Kodos set the plate down in front of him along with a tall glass of milk. Jim's eyes widened. The sandwich was huge. He had forgotten how large food portions could be. Seeing the sandwich, Jim really did believe Kodos. Kodos really had found a way to save them.

"Go on, child. Eat." Kodos smiled at him. He flashed his set of pearly whites.

Jim nodded. He reached for the sandwich. The first half he swallowed quickly. He hadn't realized just how hungry he was.

"Slowly, child, or you'll choke." Kodos smiled. "Do you like it? I rarely have any chance to cook for children."

Jim looked up from his glass of milk.

Kodos had been so nice to him. He was like a father that Jim never had. A father he had always wanted. Frank had been a bitter disappointment.

"Do you want a kid?" Jim was coy. He always had been.

Kodos laughed. "Very much. Maybe, a little girl with golden, blonde hair and blue eyes... Maybe someday I'll be luck enough. Hmm?" Kodos smiled.

"Maybe," Jim smiled back.

He wasn't a girl, but maybe... maybe for Kodos he could be.

They sat in silence as Jim finished his sandwich. Kodos watched him in amusement. When he finished, Kodos stood up.

"Come, child. Let me show you to your new room."

"Room?"

"Of course. With the nasty business of the famine soon behind us, you will need to start your lessons: piano, singing, dancing, intrigue, leadership, history. We have lost so much time." Kodos steered him away from the kitchen. They went upstairs to a section of the house that Jim had never been to before.

They ended up inside a large bedroom. It was twice the size of his bedroom back home in the Riverside, and so much larger than the room he shared with Kevin. There was a bed in center. It was a large queen sized bed. There was a dresser in one corner and a console in the other. There was large rug in the middle of the room. Above all it was fully furnished.

"I'll let you settle you." Kodos said before leaving. "Dinner is at 7." He added before disappearing. Jim watched as the door closed behind Kodos. He heard the sound of the door latching shut. He vaguely wondered if Kodos had just locked him in. He wondered if he should investigate further, but his head felt funny.

As he sank into the bed and tethered on the edge of sleep, he wondered if Kodos had drugged him and why he wasn't more concerned.

Kodos later mentioned to Jim that he had notified the Riley's of his new residence. They sent their good wishes.

For a month, Jim lived in Kodos' house. Every day he ate lavishly. After the first night when he had thrown up everything he ate, he learned to pace his food intake. He was no longer hungry. Kodos really had saved them. He couldn't wait to see his friends or the Riley's again. He mentioned it once to Kodos at dinner. Kodos waved his hands dismissively and asked about his studies.

For one month Jim lived in the illusion that everything was alright. For one month, Jim acted like the perfect, obedient daughter. He didn't mention his friends or the world outside the confines of Kodos' house after that night. Kodos filled his days with lessons, and there was Kodos' personal library with books… real books. Jim found himself spending hours in the study immersed in Kodos' classics.

He trusted Kodos. He trusted that because he wasn't hungry anymore, nobody else was either.

He practiced his piano, read his books, but most of all he started to wonder when he stopped thinking of Kodos as Kodos but as 'father'. He wasn't his dad. That would always be reserved for the man who had saved 800 lives. The one he would never know.

It had taken Jim a day to realize that Kodos really had locked him in his bedroom. It would have taken less if he hadn't been so god damn tired. The latching sound he had heard the first day was the sound of the door locking shut. For some reason, he never confronted Kodos about it. This was Kodos' house. Maybe there was a reason he didn't want him wandering around late at night. Also, Kodos never did it during the day. During the day, Jim was free to wander thru the mansion. He just chose to spend most of the free hours in that vast library.

Jim had been in Kodos' mansion for three weeks when it first happened. Jim had stayed up late reading a book. He thought he was dreaming when he felt the dip in the bed created by another body weight and hot breaths traveling down his back. He didn't dare to open his eyes. He didn't dare to move. He only fell asleep when he heard the sound of the Kodos' 'rooster' crow. He told Jim the first morning he had spent the night months ago that it reminded him of a different time.

"There is nothing like waking up to the sound of a rooster's crow."

However when he finally woke up, the space next to him was empty. There wasn't a trace that someone had been sleeping there. Jim thought he was just being delusional, or maybe he didn't want to know. He found himself stalling. It took him twice as long to comb his hair.

He tugged at the collar of his turtleneck shirt. He wore turtlenecks almost constantly now to cover his barely formed Adam's apple. His voice hadn't started to crack yet. As he looked into the mirror, he realized how female he was starting to look. He tilted to his side. As he fattened his shirt, he realized that his breasts had gotten larger over the months. He was starting to fill out now that he was no longer starving.

When he finally entered the dining room, there was a plate of breakfast and a PADD on the table with a list of readings and lessons he was required to read. His lessons were getting more and more interesting.

Kodos wasn't anywhere. He ate a silent breakfast, and Jim was glad. He had never been good with confrontation, especially this. As he took a bite of egg, Jim realized he had let out a sigh he didn't even know he was holding.

It happened again and again.

After the fourth time, Jim knew he wasn't hallucinating. He didn't understand. He really didn't. The morning after, Kodos had left him a note on a PADD along with his lessons. It was a note stating that he would be tied up in meetings all day and to find his own lunch.

Jim slammed the PADD down. The mansion suddenly felt constricting. He was going tell Kodos he didn't want any more lessons. He was going to leave. He secretly hoped it was a misunderstanding. It had to be a misunderstanding. Maybe Kodos thought he was lonely. Did parents sleep with their children like that? _Fuck_. It wasn't like he had any points of reference.

He spent the day in his room. He sat in a chair that was directly across from the door and simultaneously far from the bed. He eyed both wearily.

He felt himself almost dozing off when the door opened. Jim looked up. His eyes immediately snapped open.

Kodos stumbled in. He looked drunk. Kodos was already half stumbling, half walking to the bed. Jim pulled his legs to his chest. He watched Kodos pull off his shirt and casually toss it to the floor. He toed off is boots.

Jim flinched when the book he had set down fell off the chair. It seemed to have shaken Kodos from his stupor. He immediately looked up. His eyes were wild and primal. He crossed the room in five quick strides. His body was imposing and larger than normal. He grabbed Jim's arm with one hand. Jim tried to break free, but Kodos' grip was strong.

With his other hand, Kodos ran his fingers through Jim's blonde curls. "God, are you beautiful my little blue eyes." His breath reeked of alcohol and tobacco. It reminded him of Frank. In fact, everything about the situation reminded him of Frank.

Jim pulled harder. "Let go!" He shouted. He pulled back.

Kodos grabbed both of his arms, hard. He smiled as he shook him. It was cold smiled. "Oh my little blue eyes," he practically cooed. "You silly, silly child," he said sluggishly.

"Let go," Jim shouted again. His voice became more frantic. God, he needed to get away.

Kodos laughed. "Child, don't you want to know what I've been doing all day?"

"No." Jim really didn't care. _Fuck_. He needed to get away.

"But child," Kodos smiled. He ran a finger over Jim's cheeks. He cupped his chin before tilting his face upwards. Jim could smell the alcohol in his breath. "Oh Jane." He laughed. In that moment, Jim saw insanity. He saw the eyes of an insane man. The same look that for months he had been turning a blind eye to.

Jim pushed back on the balls of his feet. The force was enough for him to slip free. His wrist was still thin from the starvation he had previously experienced.

Kodos didn't grab him again. He even seemed confused. Jim ducked past the man. As he reached the door, Kodos called for him. "Child, oh child," he slurred his words together. He shook his head berating. "Tomorrow is a dawn of a new era. We're going to follow in the path of the great men of the past. Rid the world of waste."

Jim spun around. His eyes became large and blue. He watched as Kodos fell into bed.

This would become a moment in his life that Jim would come to regret. He would regret that he didn't march back into the room and demand to know what Kodos meant. Instead he ran. He ran from that mansion. Because at thirteen, Jim still believed. He believed he was still too young, too insignificant to do anything.

He ran from Kodos' mansion and back into the settlement. It was eerily quiet. The lights that were normally lit outside the adobe houses were all turned off.

Jim, who had made this walk for months now, managed to find his way to the Riley's assigned residence. As he reached the door, he was startled at not hearing the sound of voices. It wasn't that late. Normally nights involved Tom playing on his bagpipes and Joan singing an old Irish song. They would sit in the living room with all the windows open to let in the autumn winds.

He and Kevin would share a couch. Afterwards they would play a board game or a card game, and then he and Kevin would curl up together in bed while Jim would read him a story off his PADD or tell a story he had heard from memory or make one up.

The door swung open the moment Jim touched it. It was strange. He knew Tom always locked the door at night, an old Earth habit that he never broke.

His eyes widened as he stepped inside. The soft moonlight that entered the windows was enough for Jim to see the destruction that had taken place in the home. Kodos' words resonated in his ears. "Kevin! Tom! Joan!" He screamed the names. He crashed through the house. He left the door wide open. It swung back and forth in the wind.

"Kevin!" He shouted again. _Fuck_.

The kitchen was in just as much of disarray as the small living room. Jim saw the remnants of what appeared to the Riley's dinner. There were smashed plates and bowls. The plant that Joan had tenderly cared for since before his arrival was lying on its side. The clay pot that Kevin had made from the clay of Tarsus for the plant was cracked in half. Dirt and brown water were leaking steadily from the base of the pot.

As he proceeded to leave the kitchen, he heard the faint sounds of a child's whimper. He immediately pivoted around. "Kevin?" he whispered. The sound seemed to immediately disappear. "Kevin," he said again. He walked around the kitchen table and into the adjoining laundry room. It was near dark in there. The moonlight didn't travel this far into the house. "Kevin," he said again. He scanned the room. It was hard to see past the shadows of the appliances and the freshly laundered clothes hanging on the racks.

It was only because he heard the quiet rustle that he located the little boy curled behind drying laundry and the washing machine. Jim immediately bent down. "Kevin?" he said again. He reached forward. He waved his arm around widely. He felt so blind.

The little boy bristled.

"It's Jane," Jim whispered.

"Jane," Kevin whispered, a little confused. He saw Kevin's eyes widen. He felt the little boy crash into him. Kevin seemed thinner than the last time he saw him nearly a month ago. He could practically feel the little boy's rib cage poking through his thin shirt.

Kevin's grip tightened around him. Jim wrapped his own arms around Kevin. The boy buried himself into Jim's chest. He trembled. Jim stood up. It was awkward. Kevin's weight; however, light nearly toppled them both over.

At that moment, Kevin pulled away. Jim could see traces of salt from dried tears and sweat. "Jane, we have to hide. Mommy said to hide."

Jim felt his blood run dry. "Kevin, where's your mom and dad? Where are Tom and Joan?"

Kevin looked like he was going to cry again. He sniffed. "They took them."

"Who did?"

"They…. Mommy said to hide. We have to hide Jane. They're going to come back," Kevin rambled. He was frantic. He pulled on Jim's shirt, tugging it forward.

"Who Kevin?" Jim asked again. _Oh god. If what Kodos had told him…_ "Kevin, you got to tell me. Who?"

"The guards…" Kevin breathed out.

"When?"

"A… a few hours ago…" Kevin managed to breathe out.

"Fuck."

"Jane?"

"Come on. We got to go see Jack…" Jack, Jim was sure he had connections to Starfleet.

"No, Jane, hide." Kevin said again.

Just as Jim opened his mouth to answer, he heard the sound of footsteps. It seemed so close. Kevin's eyes widened. "Jane…"

Jim pressed his finger to his lips. He scanned the room. There wasn't a door or a window in the laundry room. The footsteps were getting closer. The kitchen didn't have a direct view to the front door. He backed up. He set Kevin down. The boy tightened his grip on Jim's arm. Jim motioned at the kitchen hoping that Kevin would understand. Kevin nodded.

They crept into kitchen. They stayed in the shadows. As Jim opened the window, the footsteps reached the front porch. As he hoisted Kevin through the window, the door swung open. The living room lit up. As he climbed through the window, he saw the guards Kevin spoke of. They were holding a PADD and torch lights. They looked annoyed and determined. As he lowered himself down, he heard them calling out 'Kevin Riley'.

He landed hard on the balls of his feet. He flinched upon impact. Kevin immediately latched on again. His eyes were wide. "Jane."

Jim pressed his index finger to his lips.

Kevin bit his lips. He looked like he wanted to cry. Jim pulled him along. He needed to get to Jack or any one of his friend's house. Maybe he should see Ms. Kimura. She had been a Starfleet officer once upon a time, but she was old now.

They stayed under the shadows of the plants and buildings. Kevin followed closely behind. It was so dark. Once they were far enough away, Jim chanced turning around. He saw that the Riley's house was partially lit. He could make out the guards' figures through the windows. It seemed they hadn't given up the idea that Kevin was still in the house. Jim's only consolation was that he had returned for Kevin when he did.

Jack's house was nearly at the other end of the settlement. Jack's family had been one of the first to arrive on Tarsus. Jim had only been to Jack's house a handful of times. He pulled Kevin to the back of the house. Jack's room was at the back of the house. He tapped the window. "Jack," he half whispered, half shouted. "Jack."

He was surprised how fast Jack's face appeared at the window. He didn't even look like he had been sleeping. Jim backed away as Jack pushed open the window. "Jane?"

"Jack…" Jim started. Jack motioned behind him. Jim nodded.

Minutes later, he and Kevin were in Jack's house. It was dark like every other house in the settlement. He followed Jack into his room. Jack immediately pulled the door shut when they entered. Jim nearly did a double take when he noticed that Eli, Thomas, Jennifer and Aiko had all assembled in the room. They were sitting on the floor. Their faces lit up by the moonlight.

"Jane…" Jennifer immediately stood up.

"We have to contact Starfleet," Jim blurted out.

"What the hell," Eli positively groaned.

"It's Kodos. He's going to do something tomorrow." Even at the words left his lips, he realized how lame it sounded.

"Yeah, he's going to save us," Jennifer explained.

"Save?" Jim said incredulously.

"I thought you were living with him."

"I thought." Jim shook his head. His eyes widened. In the last month, Jim had lived with the idea that Kodos had already saved the colony, but now… from the moonlight he could see just how thin his friends were. They looked as thin and boney as Kevin. The little boy was still clinging tightly to his pants legs. The dawn of the new era, Kodos' infatuation with Hitler and Napoleon and the Eugenics wars, and then Kodos' belief that only the useful deserved to live. _Kodos was going to… he was going to…_ He felt his blood run cold. "Kodos is going to purge the settlement tomorrow."


	9. Chapter 9

**A/N: **Sorry for the extreme delay in this chapter. I never planned for these Tarsus chapters to take so long, or become so detailed. Due to that, I had to figure out/work out what actually occurred in this universe's Tarsus massacre. The next chapter should not take this long.

**Chapter 9**

"What the fuck Jane!" Eli blurted out. His other three friends just stared at him at a loss for words. He felt Kevin's grip on his pant legs tighten.

Aiko was the next to recover. "Jane, that's a really serious accusation." She was always the pragmatic one. She pressed her fingers together to her chest.

"You can't just go saying stuff like that," Thomas added.

Jim rolled his eyes. Only Kevin was looking at him with big chocolate brown eyes.

_Fuck_...

He probably should not have said that. The little boy looked ready to burst into tears.

"You're just being paranoid, Jane." Eli squeezed the ball that he had been holding even tighter. Jim watched the ends spewed out from between his fingers. They morphed into heads, hundreds and thousands of heads. Heads that would roll, heads that would bleed, heads that would contain lifeless eyes if he couldn't convince his friends that he wasn't crazy.

"No, I'm not. I fucking swear. We have to contact Starfleet."

"Starfleet?" Eli almost laughed incredulously, but Jim stopped paying attention to Eli. He instead turned to look at Jack and Aiko. He was certain Jack had ties to Starfleet, and so did Aiko through her great grandmother. "Starfleet doesn't care about us, Jane. In fact, I'm surprised you still care. Why are you even here? I thought you were a Kodos supporter. Parroting that 'Kodos can save us'." Jim wanted to punch him, but he didn't have the time, and he hated to admit it but he probably would need him… for whatever the fuck they were about to do.

"Stop it, Eli," Jack cut in. He had been silent this whole time, him and Jennifer. Jennifer looked pale. "Maybe Jane is right."

Eli threw him a look.

"It is a little odd that they rounded up half of the population tonight. You said it yourself." Jack pointedly added.

Eli closed his mouth.

"And…" Jack took a deep breath. "If she's right, well… that's really bad."

"And what if she isn't?"

"Then at least Starfleet will know. We'll get help. Obviously, Kodos isn't doing anything."

"And what are we going to do?"

"I overheard some men talking at Pa's shop the other day. Supposedly there is a laboratory a few days' walk away. Maybe we could take a hover car?" Jennifer suggested. She pulled her legs against her chest.

_A laboratory?_

That didn't sound right. Jim had always assumed Tarsus was empty save from this tiny settlement in the middle of nowhere, but he didn't have time to think about it. "That'll take too long."

"Jane's correct. We need something immediate."

Eli sighed. "This is stupid, but there are trans-receivers in the government building." Jack gave him an incredulous look. "I don't know if they work though. Mom says she's never seen anyone actually use it."

"We can't break into a government building."

Aiko let out a gasp. "I… I think great grandma has one… in the school house. I think they gave it to her to send our progress reports back to Starfleet, but… I don't know if she actually ever used it." Aiko immediately deflated. She tucked back a piece of her hair behind her ears.

"The school house is definitely safer." Jim nodded. He looked down at Kevin. The little boy was sobbing into his pant legs. They couldn't take Kevin with them, but Jim didn't want to leave him behind either.

He wondered if Jack noticed too.

"We don't all need to go to the school house, and even if we do manage to alert Starfleet. We don't know when Kodos will …" Jack trailed off.

At least Jack believed him, and maybe they were all starting to, even Eli. Jim saw him bite his lower lip. Jim hoped he was wrong, but the clues were all there.

"Dawn?" Thomas finally spoke up. He had been so quiet this whole time Jim had forgotten he was even there.

"Dawn?"

"It'll be the first sunrise of the New Year."

"New Year?"

"Tonight's Tarsus' New Year Eve," Aiko explained. "That's why we're all here," she further explained.

Jim faltered. "That wasn't right. There was almost another week until New Year. He knew because his birthday was exactly three days after New Year Day, January 4th." He would be fourteen. It would be fourteen years since his dad's death, and his mother stopped smiling.

"That's for Earth. Tarsus's cycle around its sun is a few days shorter."

"So you better be right, Jane," Eli added. "Cause we'll look really dumb if we're actually crashing a New Year's party."

"New Year's party?"

"Surprised you know about it. It's a lottery or something. You have to be chosen." Eli emphasized. He dug into his pant pocket and pulled out a leaflet. It was parchment paper. He handed it to Jim. He didn't know what he was expecting, but he definitely wasn't expecting this. It looked so innocent, so real, that for a moment Jim really thought he was wrong, that Kodos was the man he always thought he was. The honorable leader who had saved them all like he promised, but one quick look at Kevin and his friends, he knew he wasn't wrong. Kodos wasn't that man. He wasn't wrong. He crumpled the leaflet with his hand.

"We'll need a plan, and more people."

"My brother," Aiko immediately added.

Jim didn't even know Aiko had a brother.

"He's older," Aiko explained.

It wasn't a bad idea. In fact, the more Jim thought about it, the more sense it made. He barely got his friends to believe him. There was no way he could convince grownups about his fears. They would need help and a lot of it.

Jim nodded. His friends, one by one, nodded too. Kevin tightened his grip on Jim's pant legs.

Jack led them out the back. Jim noticed the small trail of white light that escaped from the edge of what could only be of Jack's parents' bedroom. They could go to them. Let adults take care of this, but Jim quickly doused that idea. He had trusted once. He trusted Kodos. He trusted his mother. He trusted many adults, and they all let him down. Now it was his turn. He was going to save them.

The dirt streets of Tarsus were quiet. It was eerily quiet considering it was New Year's Eve. Aiko lived a few houses down from Jack. Her great grandma and grandpa lived across the street; however, they walked past those houses.

"Tsuneha lives down there," Aiko motioned. She led them up a dirt path. His brother's home was a small adobe house. She knocked softly before pushing inside to complete darkness. "Tsuneha!" She called out.

A dark shadow suddenly appeared. Jim nearly back up until he realized it belonged to a tall, towering young man. He had Aiko's eyes and her dark hair. "Aiko!" He pulled her into a tight hug. Jim noted how she held on to him for a fraction of a second longer and clung to him a little tighter. Jim couldn't fault her for that. In that moment, Jim knew that Aiko did believe him. Maybe they all did.

She pushed away from her brother a moment later. "Tsuneha…" She started. She stopped with another figure appeared. He was shorter than Tsuneha. He had a dark coffee complexion. He was cradling a small bundle in his arms. His dark chocolate brown eyes looked worried at he looked from Tsuneha, to Aiko and then to Jim.

"Aiko?" The man stepped into the foyer and passed the tight, whimpering bundle to Tsuneha. Jim felt Kevin's grip loosen on his pant leg. He noticed how intently he was looking at the tiny bundle. Jim gently pushed the little boy forward. He didn't need to hear about their plans.

"Jude, Tsuneha…" Aiko looked at him. Jim wondered if she was asking him, as if it was a final peal that he was joking. That this was all on big, elaborate joke, and Kodos wouldn't…

But Jim knew; he knew just as he knew that in a few hours the sun would rise that he wasn't wrong. He still didn't understand why Kodos had warned him. He wondered if Kodos even meant to warn him.

He stepped forward. He wasn't going to make Aiko tell her brother, and who Jim guessed was her brother-in-law and niece or nephew.

"I'm Ji… Jane. Aiko's friend…"

"We know," Tsuneha stopped him. "Great grandma told us. She volunteered you to train under Kodos."

Jim noted the contempt in his eyes when he spoke Kodos' name. He wondered how many others hated Kodos. How many others would fight with them?

He watched as Kevin walked over to Tsuneha and gently placed his hand around the tiny child in Tsuneha's arms. At least Kevin wasn't listening. He didn't need to know. He watched as Jude noticed and drew the little boy into the adjourning room with the tiny bundle. Jim was thankful for that. Kevin had already cried earlier.

Once Jude appeared again, Jim continued. He spoke softer now.

"Kodos has a plan to kill half the colony tomorrow. His own eugenics program… his plan to save the colony…" As he spoke, the words, they seemed to just flow outwards. It didn't even sound like they were coming out the mouth of a thirteen-year-old. The words that he hadn't spoken to his friends, these were the thoughts that had been tumbling around in his mind.

He saw Tsuneha raise a hand to his mouth. He saw Jude's eyes harden.

"We think that's what he's planning to do under the disguise of the New Year Eve party." Jim finished lamely. He hoped they believed him because the more he spoke those words, the more ridiculous he knew it sounded; however, similarly the realer they became.

Tsuneha choked out an inaudible sound from the back of his throat.

"Ol…older brother?" Aiko whispered out. She seemed to be shaking.

"If Jane's right then… Mom, Dad, Great grandma…" Tsuneha trailed off.

"She's not lying." Jack stepped forward. "She ain't. We need help to save them."

"Half the colony was invited," Jude countered.

"That means half can still help us. And there must be others like Kevin's parents that hid their children, that suspected," Jim continued speaking. "We're going to split up into groups. Contact Starfleet, reconnaissance, and gather support…" The plan tumbled from Jim's lips. It was still hazy, but the more he spoke, the more hope gathered within him that maybe they could actually pull this off.

Kodos might have taken half the colony, but that also meant half the colony was still around to help. They had to help. "We're four thousand strong." He looked at his friends, at Aiko's brother, and towards the room where Kevin was currently sitting in. They had to help, for Kevin's sake, for Aiko's sake, and for all the other men and women he didn't know.

"Supposedly, Ms. Kimura has a transmitter we can use to send a message to Starfleet. Aiko and Eli are going to send them a message. Jack and Jennifer and I are going to scout out Kodos' estate…" He picked Jack because he knew Jack wouldn't agree otherwise, and Jennifer was quick on her feet. "Thomas and Kevin can convince the rest of the colony to join." He quickly finished. He left off Tsuneha and Jude because he wasn't sure if they were going to help.

When his friends didn't protest, he turned to Tsuneha and Jude.

"Tsuneha can help Thomas. He knows the caverns the best, but I'm coming with you Jane."

Jim opened his mouth to protest, but then shut it. It wouldn't hurt: another pair of eyes.

Tsuneha looked at him for a moment before speaking. At the moment, Jim realized why Aiko had suggested her brother. "There's a series of underground caverns a few kilometers away to the north. We can meet up there."

"Tsuneha and Jude are Starfleet geologists," Aiko stated proudly. "He and Jude were sent here to study the caverns of Starfleet. There is a huge underground system beneath us!"

"Aiko," Tsuneha spoke fondly. He set a hand on his sister's shoulder.

It wasn't a bad idea. It would keep the resistance protected and together. "Okay."

"Then we should go," Jack stepped forward. At the moment, Kevin ran out of the room. Jim wondered how long the little boy had been listening. He immediately latched onto the corner of his shirt.

"No!"

Jim looked over at Thomas and Jack. The two boys quickly looked away. Jim sighed before bending down to Kevin's eye level. He looked at Jim with his big, chocolate browns eyes. "You got to stay with Thomas and Tsuneha. You can protect the baby." Jim quickly added. He could feel useful and maybe that would make all the difference.

"No." Kevin shook his head. He tightened his grip on Jim's shirt. "I want to go with you."

Jim sighed. Theoretically Kevin could come with them. He was fast for his age, but there was a part of Jim… a part that feared what he saw. It was the same reason he had insisted that Aiko and Eli send the message to Starfleet. Because how pale Eli looked, how he hadn't spoken once, Jim was started to getting a feeling that members of Eli's family must have been invited to Kodos' party's too.

"You can't."

"But…"

"Jane…" Jack's voice called behind him. He detected the urgency in his voice. Jim wasn't dumb. They were fighting time, and Jim had learned a long time ago that it's near impossible to win against time. He spotted the glimmer of silver in Kevin's pant pocket.

Kevin's pocket watch, the one his dad gave him for his birthday.

Jim drew it from Kevin's pocket. The little boy looked at his quizzically. "Remember what your dad said about this watch?"

Kevin shook his head.

"Your granddad carried this watch with him during the Great War. He believed as long as…"

"The watch ticked, he'll come home." Kevin finished. He looked up at Jim will his large imploring eyes. "You'll come back? With Mama and Papa and everyone else Kodos took?"

He looked up at Thomas and Jack. He saw as both boys looked away. It was his promise to keep. "As long as the watch ticks, we'll come back, Kevin. You listen for it." He placed the watch into the little boy's hands. Jim saw him cradle it as if it was the most important thing in the world. "Now you go help Thomas and Tsuneha."

"Okay." Kevin nodded his head. He bit his lips then grinned. "You're going to be superheroes Jane, the league of J's."

Jim laughed. "Yeah, that's right, buddy."

Kevin then took Thomas' larger hand; it dwarfed both Jim and Kevin's. He watched as they disappeared into the darkness of the night with Tsuneha leading the way.

"You shouldn't have done that, Jane," Jack broke the silence.

"I know, but I had too," Jim clenched his fist. Because he had to try, he was going to try his hardest to save them all. "Let's get going." He closed his mouth before any more promises left his lips, before he had to make any more promises that he wasn't sure how he was going to keep.

And that, that scared him the most.


	10. Chapter 10

**A/N: **I never meant for the events on Tarsus to take so many chapters. It was actually supposed to have only been one or two chapters, but these characters had a story they wanted to tell.

Because of that I've decided to reorganize the structure of this first fic in the series. I've decided to break what would have been one fic into three shorter pieces.

Hence the revised summary and title.

**Chapter 10**

Jim led Jack, Jennifer, and Jude, they were the league of J's, as Kevin had called them, through Kodos' grounds. He had walked this path so many times he could do it blindfolded. He knew every bush, every fountain, and every spot that was cast in shadow.

He hoped Aiko and Eli would be able to figure out how to get the trans-receiver working. That they would be able to get a message through to Starfleet because the further Jim walked, the less confident he was about this plan.

It was almost midnight. If Thomas was right, they only had seven hours before dawn… before… Jim didn't want to think about the alternative. He couldn't.

He looked back behind him. His friends and companions' faces mirrored his own. He hoped Thomas, Kevin and Tsuneha would be able convince more people to help. They had to help.

Kodos had 'invited' four thousand people to his 'New Year's' party.

As they rounded the last hedge, the pit of Jim's stomach dropped. He felt Jennifer bump up against his back.

"Jane!" Jack hissed. "Wha…" The words died from his lips at that moment.

And Jim knew, he knew he wasn't hallucinating.

It seemed in those weeks that he had been staying in Kodos' mansion, Kodos had erected a large coliseum like structure in his backyard. There were large, blinding white lights that shown into the stadium located on the four axis of a compass. It was shorter than the ancient Roman one. The walls were barely taller than one and half full grown men. Jim could tell it was also smaller volume wise from the Roman one which could hold over 80,000 spectators comfortably. If anything close to a stampede happened, it could be just as deadly. Jim wondered if Kodos had chosen these dimensions for that reason.

"What the fuck is that?!" Jack cursed out.

"Clearly our destination," Jennifer commented.

"The south side," Jim muttered. They turned to look at him. "There's a second entrance on that side," he clarified. Jim had taken them through the east. The north and west sides were both bordered by Kodos' mansion. They each nodded.

They crossed the length of the garden and a quarter of the stadium's outer wall in record time. They could hear muffled sounds coming from inside. They hastened their movements. At the southernmost point, Jim noted a set of rocks that were perturbing slightly outwards from the wall of the stadium. Jim vaguely wondered if Kodos had intentionally constructed the walls with these footsteps. The idea died from Jim's mind as they stepped on the stones. He lifted his eyes over the edge of the walls, just barely high enough to see and hopefully not be seen.

The moment Jim looked over the wall, his heart nearly stopped.

Four thousand people were standing inside. Four thousand hungry stricken men, women, children, and even babies pressed against their mothers' blossoms, were just standing there. Just as Jim had feared, there wasn't nearly enough space for everyone. They were nearly all shoulder to shoulder. Jim couldn't understand why they weren't questioning what was going on. How could anyone think this was a party?

The adults seemed to be talking amongst themselves in hushed voices.

Jim noticed a few stubs of holly hanging along the wall. It was the only thing festival about the whole set up.

He scanned the stadium quickly.

Neither Kodos nor any of his men were anywhere in sight.

_Maybe Kodos was just really bad at hosting parties?_

Jim shook his head. That was ridiculous. He had entered some of Kodos' parties during the summer, before everything suddenly went to hell. They had all been lavished parties. They were nothing like this one.

Jim gripped the sides of the wall. His fingertips dug into the stone wall. He can feel the loose pebbles burrowing under his fingernails. They had gotten long. He had forgotten to trim them.

Half of him wanted to throw their entire plan away. They were only here to observe. They weren't going do anything. They weren't enough of them. However, now that he was here all he wanted to do was jump over the wall and… and… the thought died from Jim's mind. He couldn't. He knew that.

He turned towards his friends. Jennifer looked pale, while Jack and Jude just looked angry.

"We can't." Jennifer muttered.

Jim looked at her.

"We can't charge in like that. We can't make a scene." Her voice sounded so level. The words Jim couldn't say.

Before any of them could respond, there was a loud bang. They all turned their heads back to the arena. They peered over the wall. From the north, a figure walked out. He was flanked by four guards on each side. Jim counted them easily. He had always been fast with numbers.

Jim recognized the figure immediately. He could recognize that stature from anywhere. It was Kodos. Jim took a deep breath as he watched the man head for the elevated podium. He watched as he held out his hands, palms facing upwards towards the heavens. The arena went quiet.

The man smiled.

"Citizens!" He shouted. Jim can hear him so clearly… so clearly. The words vibrated through the coliseum. "Tonight is a glorious night, a night of history… the dawn of a new era. Mankind has always strived for perfection, for superiority. Even nature looks for a way to survive, to rule out the weak, the inferior so that only the strongest, the most superior lives. Food is running out. The Federation relief ships are four weeks out. However we only have enough food to sustain the entire colony for two weeks, or half the colony for four weeks."

Jim took a deep breath.

"As a result, it is with a heavy heart, after long, agonizing hours of analyzing the data, we…" Kodos motioned towards guards surrounding around him, "have determined all who is assembled here to be the inferior breed." Kodos pulled out a sheet of paper from his pockets. He looked down at it before he continued to speak. "The revolution is successful. But survival depends on drastic measures. Your continued existence represents a threat to the well-being of society. Your lives mean slow death to the more valued members of the colony. Therefore, I have no alternative but to sentence you to death. Your execution is so ordered, signed Kodos, Governor of Tarsus IV."

Kodos looked up.

Even from so far away, he could see a small smile forming on Kodos' lips. He looked directly in Jim's direction, and at that moment Jim wondered if Kodos knew he was there. For his eyes lingered on him for a fraction of a second. He recognized the madness in his eyes. However, what scared Jim the most was that even through the insanity, Jim recognized him as the man who said 'checkmate' to him during those long, hot summer nights when he taught him how to play 3D chess. He could still recognize the man who taught him about the world, about history, and for a second made him feel wanted.

And then it began.

The thousands of shots that were fired through the night sky hailing in the dawn of the New Year. Over and over the guards fired their guns. They weren't even phasers. Instead they used the ancient weapons of the past: the guns with bullets, with gunpowder.

He heard the screams. He heard the cries. He saw the rivers of red that ran through the stone platform of the coliseum that penetrated between the stone tiles to forward stain the ground red with blood. The air smelt like iron. It tasted like death, sorrow and sadness.

And all he could do was stand there and watch. All he could do was stand on that stone ledge and watch helplessly as four thousand died in front of him, as four thousand people were murdered in cold blood.

Most of all, his throat felt so, so raw.

"Jane!"

"Jane!"

"Stop it!"

_Jack!_

His eyes, that he hadn't noticed he had firmly shut, snapped open. Jack's arms were on his shoulders. He was shaking him furiously. He immediately closed his mouth. He had been screaming.

"God Jane," Jack hissed; however, there was very little malice in his voice. His hands dropped from Jim's shoulders. He turned to look at Jennifer and Jude. They both looked visibly pale.

He had failed. He had failed Aiko. He failed Kevin. He failed them all. All those people dying or dead in the coliseum. Kodos had told him. He really did think 'tomorrow is a dawn of a new era' had meant dawn. That would have many hours to plan a resistance, not until the stroke of midnight.

"We should see if there are any survivors," Jude muttered.

Jim looked up. Of course, Jude didn't have any blood relatives living on Tarsus, but Tsuneha and Aiko did. Their whole family had been invited. Jim nodded.

By the time they found an opening, the cries and moans had already died down. None of them had the stomach to scale the wall. It was only a person and a half in height.

Kodos and his soldiers had long disappeared. The spot lights had been turned off. The only light was from the moons of Tarsus.

The ground was sticky. The air tasted more like iron here than on the other side.

Jim quickly looked away when he spotted bloodied claw marks along the east wall. There was a pile of bodies scattered at the base of another.

His friends had gone off in different directions. He noted how Jennifer walked slowly, stopping at each body. He watched her tenderly place two fingers along the neck of each body she passed. He noted how she would turn away in disappointment.

Jude was more frantic. He barely gave most of the bodies a passing glance, but Jim could understand that. There were thousands, thousands of bodies here: four thousand bodies. And he had to find Tsuneha and Aiko's parents and grandparents.

Jack fell in between. He didn't walk as fast as Jude, but he also didn't stop at each body like Jennifer did. However, he too seemed to be looking for somebody. He never did ask their friends if they had family here. He had just assumed Jack and Jennifer didn't.

He didn't have time for regrets. He had to find Joan and Tom. He had promised Kevin.

He chose to go north, north where Kodos' main back door was.

He felt sick walking through the sea of bodies. The horror on their faces… it was the last look on most of these colonists' faces.

He suddenly felt sick.

Jim gripped his stomach and looked away.

But he couldn't escape. He couldn't escape the heavy iron smell that laced the air.

He stumbled forward.

All of the faces… all the nameless people that he never got to know but was supposed to have saved.

His nausea subsided to anger.

"Kodos…" He muttered under his breath. He would never forget that name. He would never forget that man's face, his eyes, his voice…

"I'll revenge you all."

"Jane! Jude! Jack!" Jennifer's voice pierced through the stadium.

Jim immediately turned towards his friend's cries. Jennifer was only a few feet away. She was stumped over on the ground. She seemed to be cradling something in her lap. Jim realized it was a person. She seemed to be talking to them.

He was the closest. His heart nearly dropped as he approached Jennifer.

"Ja… Jane?" She reached for him with one hand. With the other, she had it over her chest. Jennifer's hand was also over her hand. Jim could tell it was covering a wound. Red blood was seeping profusely from under her hand.

Jim fell to her side and immediately took her hand.

"Ms.… Ms. Kimura," Jim choked out.

He looked up at Jennifer. Her eyes were red from crying.

Ms. Kimura creased his cheek. "O… oh Jane… I'm so sorry." She muttered. "So sorry."

"No…" Jim shook his head, profusely. He placed his own hands over her hand before cupping them with his fingers. They felt so cold, so boney… so covered in wrinkles. "Nothing to be sorry about," Jim continued. He looked up at Jennifer who nodded quickly in agreement.

"Jude will be here soon, Ms. Kimura." Jennifer continued for him.

She smiled at them. Her chocolate brown eyes were so warm and inviting. Just like the first day he had met her so many years ago. Just like every time had taught them. Jim suddenly regretted never paying attention to her lessons. That he never got to talk to more about her past… after her adventures… got her to teach him more than xenolinguists.

_No…_

_No..._

He couldn't think like that. She was going to be fine.

"Hold on," Jim muttered. He clenched her hand tighter.

Her smile got wider.

"You… you going to tell me I'm fine?" She asked humorously.

"You will." Jim stated. His blue eyes steeled with conviction. She couldn't die. She was Hoshi Sato. She couldn't die here on Tarsus.

She smiled. She raised her other hand, the one covered in blood to cover Jim's hands. This one was warm and sticky. Jim chose to not look at it.

"D… don't lie to me now. I… I know it's bad."

Jim shook his head. She couldn't die. She couldn't. She was a hero of the Federation, a member of Archer's legendary crew.

"No…" Jim shook his head, again. "You'll be fine. Right, Jennifer?" He pleaded to his friend.

Jennifer bit her lips but nodded hurriedly through her tears.

"See! You have to be fine." Jim continued frantically. "We'll find a medic. Starfleet will be here soon." He knew he was rambling now. "Aiko's probably got through to them by now. They'll be here soon. Warp drive ain't so slow anymore. Can't take them four weeks."

She took a deep breath and smiled again.

"Star… fleet… it's a long time since I heard that name." She gasped. Her body shuttered. Jennifer tightened her hold. She coughed up a mouthful of blood.

"And… and you'll see them soon," Jim continued.

She smiled. She shook her head. "No… no it's time for me to go…"

"No!" Jim shouted out. "You can't! You… you got to teach us more."

She chuckled through the blood. "Never… never taught you anything, child. Too smart…"

Jim shook his head. "No… no that's not true."

She smiled again. She looked at them both long and hard. "D…don't lie to an old woman." She chided between her shutters. "May…maybe I can teach you one thing. Look at me children."

They both nod.

"It… it's too late for me, but… you two… you got your whole lives ahead of you. You got to live… got to tell the world…"

"We will," Jennifer muttered before her sobs.

Jim nodded.

"And… tell Johnathan… tell him… it was a pleasure… to serve with him…" Her eyes closed. She took her last breath. Her hand went limp. Jim looked up at Jennifer. Tears streamed from her eyes. Jack reached them, moments later.

He managed to loosen Jim's hand from Ms. Kimura.

Jude arrived seconds later. He fell to his knees. Jim backed up. He looked up at Jack. His friend looked horrible. He knew his face wasn't any better.

"We… we got to get out of here, Jane," Jack stated.

Jim turned. He knew that Jack was right.

Nobody could have survived. Kodos made sure of that. He didn't know much about medicine nor was he a doctor, but he knew enough to know that a normal wound shouldn't bleed that much. Ms. Kimura hadn't even been shot in a critical area. In fact most of the people hadn't been shot in critical areas. There shouldn't have been so much blood.

Kodos… Kodos must have done something.

But then he remembered the little boy waiting for him… the little boy who he promised to bring his parents back. No, he… he had to find Tom and Joan. He knew he probably couldn't save them, but he had to know. He had to remember, but he had too.

"Kevin's parents… I got to find them." Jane stated. He took off to the sound of Jack calling out his name.

He plowed through the stadium. The body of hundreds that he couldn't help, the nameless thousands who he had been too slow... too weak to save.

He found Tom and Joan near the east entrance. They looked like they hadn't tried to run. Thomas' arms were wrapped around Joan, while Joan was clenching Thomas just as tightly. He didn't even have to step closer to know. Jim choked out a cry.

"I'm soo… sorry." He muttered to the dead who couldn't hear him.

"Jane."

He looked up. It was both Jennifer and Jack. Jude was only a few steps behind them.

"We should go."

Jim nodded.

It was true. There wasn't anything they could do for these people, but there were still four thousands citizens in Tarsus who needed to know what Kodos had done.

Jim nodded.

They ran for the caves. They didn't even try to be discreet this time. They all knew there wasn't any point anymore. Kodos had already succeeded. They had failed.

They weren't even a few meters from the arena when Jim saw it: the flash of lights in the dark sky… the loud bangs that thundered overhead. He felt the heat on the back of his neck. He didn't even have to turn around to know that Kodos' men had dropped a series of fire bombs into the arena… another weapon from a bygone era.

_They are going to burn the bodies. They are going to reduce them to ashes so nobody will know. _

But he'll know… they'll know.

He now understood what Hoshi Sato was trying to say with her last breath.

He won't forget. He'll never forget.

He gritted his teeth and ran faster.


	11. Chapter 11

**Chapter 11**

There were exactly thirty of them, armed with rocks, knives, pots and pans, and any other item they could find, who stormed Kodos' mansion four hours later. Most of them were children. The oldest was Jude, and his two friends, both blacksmiths. They were all angry. They shared Jim's anger, Jim's hatred, and Jim's fear.

He wondered if it was a suicide mission.

He wondered if he would ever see Kevin again. He had been too afraid, too ashamed to find him, to tell him that his mama and papa were never coming home. He hoped, although he had learned that hope was a fragile thing, Kevin still had a family somewhere. He hoped the little boy could still find happiness.

He deserved it, more than Jim did.

He found a thousand and one reasons to avoid Kevin.

Initially it was that he didn't want to awake the boy. Tsuneha had taken the little kids, the ones they didn't want fighting, to the back of the cave. The ones whose innocence they wanted to protect, the ones whose parents had suspected at the last moment and hid their kids like Kevin's parents.

Jim wasn't sure what he should have been expecting when they arrived at the cave.

Thomas and Eli had been waiting for them outside the cave.

He hated the looks they gave them when they arrived. He remembered the hope on their faces. The hope he had once shared with them not even twenty-four hours earlier when he was still sleeping in Kodos' mansion, reading books in the bedroom that Kodos had provided for him, and god… eating a full meal when the rest of the colony were starving on half rations.

It made Jim sick just thinking about it.

So as they approached his friends, Jim had wished, god he had wished he didn't have to crush that hope.

Jack had shaken his head.

Thomas cursed while Eli just fell to the ground. "Those lights from earlier?"

"Firebombs," Jim had answered because he had too. He doubted his friends knew about those archaic and barbaric weapons.

"There was an arena. Kodos made a speech," Jennifer had explained. Her words felt so far away. "It was like he had planned it. Like he knew this would happen."

"He couldn't. Why would he?"

"Doesn't matter, now. We can't let him get away with it." Jim was done with 'what ifs'. They had been speculating all night and been wrong… so, so wrong. Because he had been wrong so many innocent colonists had to die.

"Jane?"

"He just murdered half the colony, thousands of innocent lives!"

He remembered the cry that cut through the night sky. Jim doubt he would ever forget that scream for as long as he lived.

He remembered Aiko, the normally quiet little girl, the one who was the most grown up, level headed of their group. He remembered how she had tried to run before Tsuneha had grabbed her, wrapped her tightly into his arms. He watched as she turned around and collapsed into her brother's chest. Her muffled cries pierced the night sky. She wouldn't be the only one.

For Aiko, for Kevin, for anyone else that lost someone to Kodos' brutal act, Jim was going to fight. He was going to fight for them.

"Did you get through to Starfleet?" He had asked. He feared the answer, for he had a sickening, horrible feeling that he already knew the answer.

Eli had answered. Jim barely heard half of it. "They said they'll be here as soon as possible. That they didn't know. They should have suspected when Kodos stopped contacting them."

Array of excuses… something that grownups always resorted to.

Kodos had lied.

_God. _

He had lied and murdered four thousand people. Four thousand people had died for no reason at all.

He had lied.

He was going to pay.

The rest of the time, he spent planning their attack with his friends and comrades. They estimated there should only be ten soldiers at most. There had only been eight at the execution, but Jim wasn't taking any chances.

However he knew Kodos couldn't have that many more. He had only seen a handful in all the time he had been around Kodos.

They could take on ten guards.

They had to.

He had drawn a map of the mansion onto the cave walls. He knew each hallway, each passageway, and where each door led to. He knew the best hiding places. He knew where all the 'escape' routes where.

Jim hoped it would be enough.

He knew where the 'weapons' room was. Kodos had collected a wide assortment of swords and guns. They were all locked behind glass cases. Jim doubted Kodos would have left any of the guns behind, and he knew most of their band of ragtag army didn't have the strength to wield much less carry any of the swords. However, their plan still involved barricading the path to that room.

The rest of the plan involved the ballroom. It was the largest room in the mansion. Kodos had taught him how to dance there. He had spent many hours in that room, alone with Kodos.

He hated that room.

It would be a fitting battleground.

Kodos' mansion was dark when they arrived. Jim made sure to take them around the arena. He was afraid of what he would find. He could still see the dying embers in the distance as they entered the mansion.

The front door wasn't locked.

Jim immediately realized how wrong he had been. He had been so wrong. They could have taken on ten guards, maybe even fifteen.

Instead there were over fifty.

So what hope did their band of scrawny, starving and angry boys and girls have against an army? What hope did a pile of rocks and mix-matched kitchen wear have against an army?

They were barely through the door when the blood bath started again, when the first little boy, he looked barely ten, fell.

They fought and fought.

The screams, the battle cries, the sound of hard metal against hard metal…

Their only consolation was it seemed none of these guards were aimed with phasers or guns. They seemed to have exchanged them for crude swords.

Most of all, they seemed to have been waiting for them as if they were expecting them.

Jim charged ahead in anger.

He swung his knife with a ferocity that he never thought he possessed. All he wanted was revenge. All he wanted to do was make these guards pay for what they had done.

He didn't know how long they had been fighting.

It could have been hours. It could have been minutes when he felt someone grab his arm. He nearly jerked away when he heard the familiar voice: Jack.

"Jane." Jack pulled him back just as the soldier he was engaged in swung his sword down.

"Jack!" Jim cursed. He tried to free his arm from his friend's grip. "What the fuck!"

"Just saving your life." Jack quipped.

Jim rolled his eyes. He pulled Jack back as the soldier swung down at them. Jim blocked it deftly with his makeshift shield before pushing them backwards. Another kid, whose name Jim didn't know, rushed the soldier giving them a few precious seconds. "Now we're even."

"No."

"No?"

Jack set his hand on Jim's shoulder. "It's not your fault…" Jack smiled at him. That cryptic smile Sam used to give him.

Jim felt his heart clench. He felt Jack's grip loosen. Before he could say anything… before he could stop him, Jack was gone. He disappeared into the sea of swords and blood and screams.

Before he could follow after Jack, to demand what he meant. That all too familiar voice, the one Jim knew he would never forget, echoed through the ballroom. "Enough!"

The fighting immediately stopped. All heads turned towards the source. Even Jim, even Jim froze. He tried to force himself to move. This was the perfect opportunity. All he needed to do was find Kodos. If he could find Kodos, he could end it.

But his body betrayed him. His muscles didn't want to move.

He watched as Kodos stepped forward, out of the darkness. He watched him reach the center of the ballroom, where the sun and moon had been etched into the floor pattern, the exact same place that Kodos had taught him to dance so long ago.

Kodos spun around the room, landing on each and every one of their faces.

"My poor little children, so full of spirit, life… bent on revenge." Kodos continued. He looked at Jim with those eyes… those eyes Jim doubt he would ever forget. "Are you angry because of what we did?" Kodos took a long sigh. "I did it so we could survive, so your lives wouldn't be wasted. You're so young, so naïve. You don't understand the world yet."

Jim wanted to scream that it was wrong. That it wasn't true, but like his legs, his mouth similarly refused to move. No sound left his lips.

Kodos raised his hands before clapping them together. "I will make you a bargain," Kodos continued. "You are all valiant, brave fighters. You have shown that I wasn't wrong. That you truly are the superior half."

Jim wanted to scream. That Kodos was wrong. What right did he have to judge? What right did he have to decide who was more worthy?

"If your leader surrenders, I will free the others. I will let you leave my mansion and return to your homes."

Jim wanted to cry out, to warn his friends. That Kodos couldn't to be trusted, but still his mouth refused to cooperate. He heard the closest child let out a sob. It was a little boy. He looked barely a year older than Kevin. His head was bleeding. He looked ready to topple over.

Another child, a little girl, she was a little older. He heard her whisper that she just wanted her mommy. She just wanted to go home. That she didn't want to fight anymore.

He wondered if Kodos heard.

"As for your leader," Kodos continued. "I will be merciful. You have my word."

Jim took a deep breath.

_No, he couldn't. _

He knew it was a bad idea. That Kodos could never be merciful. If he was, he wouldn't have blindly murdered four thousand colonists. He wouldn't have lied. He would have contacted Starfleet.

But then there was his army, the thirty who believed in his plan. The thirty who had joined him in his revenge.

He couldn't save the four thousand.

But he could. He could save them.

For the little boy, for the little girl, and for the small number that were still alive, he was going to do it. He was going to give himself up.

It wasn't like he could hide. Of course, Kodos knew it was him.

Even as he took that breath, his voice felt like lead. He trembled slightly. His legs wavered.

_Damn it Jim. Stop it! _He cursed to himself.

It was his fault. His fault this had to happen… he had to take responsibility. He had to face Kodos.

He trembled again. His heart pulsated fiercely.

"I am the leader." A boy's voice broke though. Jim recognized that voice.

_Jack! _

Jack stepped forward. He watched as the soldiers parted, so he could step forward. He barely took ten steps before he was facing Kodos.

Jim wanted to scream.

This wasn't right. It shouldn't… it shouldn't be Jack. It should be him, but his body betrayed him. He sank to the floor...

"You?" Jim detected the astonishment in Kodos' voice.

"Yes, I led them here." Jack answered firmly.

"Only you?" Kodos pressed. "You know lying is wrong. Lying is bad."

Jim opened his mouth to protest. He tried to pick himself up, but his feet and arms refused to move. His throat refused to yield. His hands shook harder.

"Only me," Jack nodded.

Kodos stared at him, then he smiled that sickening smile that Jim recognized all too well. Once he took comfort in it. "Well then, that settles that."

He clapped his hands together before stepping forward, closing the distance between them. He scanned the room and locked his eyes on Jim for a moment. It was so quick that Jim thought he had imagined the disappointment in his eyes.

He couldn't reveal himself now. Not with how close Kodos was to Jack.

Then it happened: faster than Jim could blink, faster than he could do anything.

Jack's body stumped forward. The tip of the blade protruded out of Jack's back before Kodos drew it out. Jack fell forward on his knees. He coughed out a mouthful of blood.

Jim's eyes widened. He was too numb to scream, too shocked to cry. All he could do was sit there on the floor, looking at Jack.

Kodos let out a sneer. He kicked Jack, so that he toppled over, so that his face was turned towards Jim. So that Jim could see as the life left his friend's face.

Kodos wiped his sword on Jack's shirt before returning it to the sheath attached to his side.

"I told you not to lie, boy." Kodos responded contemptuously before looking up. "Take the rest away."

And the nine that were still alive didn't try to fight.

Jim didn't know how long he spent in that dark chamber with the metal door. Had it been a week, a day, a month, or just a couple of hours?

He didn't know.

All he could think about in that dark cell were Jack's last words.

He dreamt of Jack's glossy eyes lying on that cold hard ballroom. He dreamt of that moment when Kodos plunged that sword through his body.

He dreamt of Ms. Kimura dying in his arms… telling him not to forget.

He dreamt of a thousand and one bloodied bodies… screaming… crawling towards him. A thousand and one faceless bodies, covered in blood asking why he didn't save them.

Why…

Why…

Why…

He dreamt of Kevin Riley and a hundred more nameless and faceless children asking for their mommies and daddies.

He spent those days, those weeks, those months; however long, he sat in that cell in a state of half sleep, half consciousness. Wondering when it would be his time. Drowning in the fact that it was his fault. That he deserved this and more.

That it should have been him and not Jack at the end of that sword. Wondering if he had stepped forward would Kodos have killed him too? Would Kodos have kept his promise.

Eventually the cell door opened. He blinked from the bright light that filtered from the door. He could make out a human figure blanketed in bright light. He squinted, unused to the light.

"Jane, oh Jane."

He backed up at that voice. The voice that he would never forget. The voice that had ordered the massacre. The voice that promised mercy but instead killed Jack.

Kodos stepped forward, till they were centimeters from each other. They were so close that Jim could hear the beating of his heart. He could feel his breath. He could smell his scent.

Kodos ran his fingers through his cheeks and then through his long flowing blonde curls. He grabbed a handful and brought it up to his nose before taking a long sniff. Jim flinched. He hoped it smelt as awful as he felt. However, whether or not it did, Kodos didn't show it on his face. He dropped Jim's long curls before placing a hand under Jim's chin and jolted it upwards so that Jim could see Kodos' sickening smile.

"God, you are so beautiful my little blue eyes."

He cupped his face with his hands.

Jim glared back at him with as much hatred as he could muster at that moment. He didn't care anymore.

He didn't have any reason to care.

"Are you angry with me? Are you angry for what I've done?"

"You said you would be merciful," Jim spat out.

Kodos laughed. He wiped away the spit that landed on his face.

"I was my little blue eyes. I gave him a quick death. Some would say that is most merciful way to die."

Jim bit his lips.

Kodos ran a finger over it. "Now, now don't do that," he chided.

He followed Kodos' fingers. They worked their way down the front of his body. Jim's eyes widened as Kodos' hand went lower and lower. He ran his fingers over his tiny breasts. Jim felt himself flinch when Kodos' pinched his right nipple through his thin undergarment. It sent a spike of emotions through his body that he had never felt before.

He pushed backwards. The force sent Kodos backwards in the opposite direction. Jim was surprised he still had so much strength left.

Kodos' eyes hardened, like Frank's.

"You really are a stubborn little one aren't you, my little blue eyes?" Kodos muttered. He shook his head regretfully.

"You have been naughty though. You've been bad. Didn't I tell you, lying is bad?" Kodos asked. He stepped forward and tapped Jim's nose. Jim wanted to bite him, kick him, do a thousand and one other things to him, all of which he didn't do. "You let that poor boy take the fall. Let him die thinking…" Kodos trailed off. His smile became sicker and sicker, as if he knew. As if he could see into Jim's soul and see all the transgressions he had ever committed. That he was alive, and Jack wasn't. That he was alive, and Kevin's parents weren't. That he was alive, and Ms. Kimura wasn't. That he was alive, and four thousand who were so much more worthy than he could ever be weren't. Most of all, he was alive, and his dad wasn't.

Jim flinched. He couldn't help it. Kodos' words were true. He might as well have plunged that sword into Jack himself.

Kodos' smile widened. It was a cold, dangerous smile.

Jim backed away further. He felt the cold, hard wall hit his back. It was as far away as he could get from Kodos, and it still wasn't enough. It would never be enough.

"Let me tell you a story."

He didn't want to hear any stories.

"Let me tell you a story about a Starfleet lieutenant commander who was the captain of a star ship for twelve minutes and saved eight hundred lives."

Jim's eyes widened. He knew that story. He had being living through the fallout of that day since the moment he was born. "I don't want to hear it."

"But it's such a great story. A man sacrifices himself so that eight hundred others can live and as result he's heralded as a hero throughout the universe. Isn't that a beautiful way to die? Hmm?"

Jim looked away as Kodos closed the distance between them. Kodos ran his fingers through Jim's cheeks. He rubbed at a patch of dirt on his face. "It's okay, child. It's okay. I understand. You think that man is stupid and selfish. Don't you? That he should have tried harder to survive instead of dying to save eight hundred nameless people who probably don't understand the ramifications of what he did. How it affected those… closest to him."

Jim bit his lips. He refused to look Kodos in the eyes because he couldn't know. He couldn't know who he really was. He couldn't know about _that_ darkness in Jim's heart. The darkness that came from him loving and hating his dad. He hated his dad for dying, for leaving him, for leaving his mother, and for leaving Sam. He hated the man who he would never meet because he cared more about his crew than for his own wife and children.

"It's really humanity's greatest flaw for a man who is destined for greatness, born of superior breed, to squander that potential by saving the inferior." Kodos paused. He looked at him. "He's no hero." He stated dryly.

"My dad is a hero," Jim blurted out. It was the first time he had ever said those words after spending years hating and loving the man. His eyes widened when he realized his mistake.

Kodos smiled. His grip tightened. "Oh, I know. I've known since the day you arrived. Together, we will make that perfect world… James Kirk."

"The Federation won't let you get away with it," Jim spat out.

Kodos laughed. The last thing Jim saw was Kodos laughing. The last thing he heard was Kodos saying "I'm afraid, Jim Kirk you really don't have much of a choice."

_Fuck._

He didn't see the hypo spray that Kodos had injected him with until it was too late.


End file.
